Decline
by AudreyMetalMouth
Summary: Ten strangers. Two and a half days. One insane mystery man with only one goal in mind...to make them all pay. - Psychological Mystery - Now complete with an ending you never saw coming!
1. Prologue

_Note to Scooby fans: This is AU, or alternate universe, so none of the gang has officially met. Perhaps they've seen each other in a store or something, but no official introductions. Thank you._

_Note to Christie fans: Set in a timeless age, this is neither 1939 nor modern day. They will have some old-fashioned speaking, and there will be references to modern technology, so there is no specific time, and the original characters from the book will not be included with the exception of Owen the mystery man. Thank you.  
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_Note to ALL: I got some of these last names from tombstones because I'm a cemetery creeper. Just kidding. But I really did get them from gravestones. And cemeteries are very calming. Ahem! But no actual combinations of the names used are real people. If they are, I apologize to the living or dead people whom they belong to. This is the only author's note I will write until the end of the story. ALSO! If you can guess the song and band whose lyric I use at the beginning of the chapter, you will receive an honorable mention in the Epilogue. Plus if you can solve the mystery you might get an extra-special shoutout...Thank you!  
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_Disclaimer: I do not own Agatha Christie, __And Then There Were None__, anything affiliated with Scooby Doo, or the awesome band the Foo Fighters whose lyrics I am using for the titles of the Prologue and Epilogue, OR any bands I'm using for the other chapters. If I owned any of them I would be stinking rich and this would be actually a book now, wouldn't it?_

"_**What if I say I'm not like the others?" Well, you'd be wrong. You are.**_

**Prologue: You Know They All Pretend, And So It All Began**

Marianne Bower, R.N.

Bradley Sylvester

Scoobert Doo

Jennifer Morley

Norville Rogers

Dorothy Pickett

Thomas Pickett

Daphne Blake

Fred Jones

Velma Dinkley

The pen paused over the checklist of names. Yes, all was in accordance with the list. All were coming; Owen had made sure of that by playing to their interests in the invitation letters. A smile crept over the face of the pen's holder. All was good and all was right. Justice would reach out its chilled, frostbitten fingers of sinew and at last touch where short-tempered and blustering law could not reach its own reddened, angry fists.

At last. Owen picked up an apple and bit into it. The juice was sweet, the skin smooth, the flesh suitably crunchy – a good omen. Owen was happy. Yes, this would work. Owen smiled, set down the apple, and began to make another list. Lists were very important.

And Owen was happy.

oOo

Fred Jones whooshed down the road at a speed that was enjoyable and certainly not legal, but hey, he thought, it's just a little old country lane. What could happen? He straightened his sunglasses and grinned, swerving around an old square car that was doddering along. "Bet they got their license from some ancient old woman," he chuckled to himself. He had a car dealership to get to. No time for old lady drivers.

Jones whistled blithely and zipped down the road. Nope, no time at all.

oOo

Velma Dinkley scowled at the bright blue convertible as it swerved, narrowly missing her. "Speeding maniac, must have learned to drive from his kid brother," she muttered. This was Gramps' car; if she let anything happen to it Gram would have a cow and throw her out of the house. Then what? She didn't have a job, she couldn't pay bills or rent.

Yet, she promised herself. I'll have to make a good impression on Mrs. Owen. Although she knew deep down already that the job was as good as hers. She could handle paperwork with no problems.

Velma sighed and slowed to a stop at a light. If she could make it in time.

oOo

Jennifer Morley's steady hands flew with her knitting needles, a disapproving frown on her face as usual. People often marveled that her hands were not troubled by arthritis. Silly fools, she thought them. Her knitting was for the Lord's glory. The Lord does not punish those who glorify Him.

The woman's frown deepened when a flight attendant offered her a drink. "I don't believe in alcoholic beverages," she said stiffly. The flight attendant apologized hurriedly and set the glass back on her cart. Good riddance, Jennifer thought scornfully. Alcohol merely clouded the mind, and the drunkard's place was in the lake of fire.

She kept knitting. Surely the airplane would land soon, and then she could see what this business with Mrs. Owen's children was about.

oOo

Daphne Blake studied the woman across the aisle and up a row. Strict, she thought, like a schoolteacher, and probably one of the kinds of people who nitpick a matter until it bled to death. She jotted this observation down and quickly sketched the woman's old-fashioned forest green dress. Perhaps the "olden days" would make a comeback and this knitting lady would become a model of good fashion.

And perhaps, she thought wryly, pigs would sprout wings.

"A drink, miss?"

Daphne glanced at the tray. "Maybe later I'll try a glass of red wine. But not now, thank you."

"Yes, miss." Polite and subservient, she noted. With a toss of luxurious red curls she refocused her attention on the man beside her. He wasn't very talkative, and kept dozing off, only to return to consciousness with a snort. An older man, balding; probably in some war or another Daphne decided at last. Yes, an officer of some sort. She smiled to herself. With observation skills such as hers she could always fall back on reporting if the nanny job didn't agree with her.

She leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes to drift off. Vaguely she wondered what the Owens would be like. They must have unruly children to call a nanny – or two, they'd said! – but Mrs. Own seemed nice enough…

oOo

Bradley Sylvester snorted awake again. It wasn't right, putting him next to this pretty young thing. She looked too much like Angela, what with that red hair and such. "War's done too much to your nerves, old boy," he mumbled to himself, turning to look out the window. He wondered groggily if they were nearing…where was he headed? Ah, yes, Marwood to take a boat out to Manse Island.

Sylvester fished around in his briefcase for the letter. There it was, from a man called Ulysses something or other. Oliver, perhaps.

_General Sylvester,_

_I am most interested in compiling a collection of stories from World Wars I and II. As I understand you fought in both and may be of service in this collection. A man by the name of Jacob Moore, who I believe served under you for a time, recommended your name to me when I mentioned this interest of mine, and I would be pleased if you would join me on Manse Island, 23 September of this year. It is in fact a Friday, which is when I am told you would most readily be available. Many thanks for your participation in this little game of whims,_

_Sincerely_

_Ulysses N. Owen_

oOo

"Are you sure you'll be alright?" Jonathan asked sadly. Scoobert Doo nodded and licked the boy's face smilingly. "Promise me you'll come home!"

"Ri romise," Scooby told him. As a therapy dog he knew it might be a long while depending on how severely Mr. Owen's wife was traumatized, but Jonathan didn't need to worry. Scooby always came home.

"Say good-bye to Scooby now, Jonathan," Mr. Bentley told his son, lifting him onto his hip. "He's on a job now, but he'll be back when Mrs. Owen is feeling better, alright?"

Jonathan nodded sorrowfully and waved as Scooby trotted off down the road to Marwood to meet the ferry. Scooby knew to stay on the sidewalks; he was responsible. He would be perfectly safe.

oOo

Norville Rogers fidgeted nervously in his seat. The cab driver was chattering still about the weather – still! After a three hour drive to Marwood, the silly old man was still on the weather!

It was a nice day though, the young man thought. The trees had not yet lost their leaves entirely, the roses were still tricked into being in full bloom and the sky was a lovely shade of blue. His friends would have appreciated it, but none so much as he. He truly believed he had been born in the wrong time period; because he cared nothing for mechanics or technology he had been called a tree-hugger among other things back in school. Rogers preferred the term environmentalist to the names he had been subjected to, but none of that mattered now, not when he had a preserve to secure.

He hoped the landscape wasn't ruined by many buildings on Manse Island. The stay would be unbearable if it was marred by human hands, and wasn't his whole purpose of coming to see if Mr. Owen would consent to a _conservation_ area?

The chatty cab driver at last pulled up to the ferry dock. "Now, you 'ave a nice vacation with all 'em other younkers, sonny!"

"Right," Rogers murmured, only half-listening. He was taking in his fellow passengers. The redheaded girl in the purple tee-shirt and jeans looked like a possible ally for nature. She caught him watching; how embarrassing. The girl shifted a notebook, also purple, to her other arm and smiled pleasantly before turning her attention elsewhere. He returned the smile too late and slid his gaze to the older, heavyset man with the prominent grey moustache. No, he would be against the preserve; the soldier types always were. Now, the old-fashioned woman with the knitting project, she might be helpful if it were presented as a tribute to the old ways she so obviously clung to. Mid-sixties, he would put her age at. He wasn't sure about the blonde woman. She looked classy, and had a professional air about her. She could go either way.

Rogers exhaled. There would be a lot of work ahead of him, that much was certain.

oOo

Marianne Bower stood quietly as the young blonde fellow zipped around a corner in his blue convertible. Proud young man, she decided. Probably arrogant and thinks he can get whatever he wants handed to him on a platter by a pretty girl. A twinge of remembrance struck her. And Evan –

No, Marianne, she told herself firmly, Evan never really wanted you. He got what he deserved in the end. That was how it always ended in the stories, wasn't it? With the bad guy getting his due…happy endings…

"Well, let's get going!" The blonde man swaggered up to the ferry master, who in turn regarded him disinterestedly.

"Young man, we are still waiting on one more of the Owens' guests," came the bored museum-guide response.

Marianne saw the young man with messy light brown hair perk up visibly. She wondered what he could possibly do to assist the Owens with their rheumatism. A horrible thought crossed her mind. Surely they hadn't hired med school students!

Just as Marianne's doubts were being raised higher and higher, an old-fashioned square car puttered up and halted with some difficulty and wheezing. A young woman, from her stature and face not much more than eighteen, exited the vehicle and breathlessly apologized, pointedly shooting a scowl in the direction of the blonde man.

Drat it. They'd gone and hired med school students.

oOo

Thomas Pickett watched, from the window of the manor on Manse Island, the ferryman loading the motorboat. These were the Owens' guests? A handful of people, most young, a few older, and a dog? He shook his head. It was not a butler's place to judge his master's guests. "Dorothy, they're almost here," he called into the kitchen.

"Alright, alright, hold your horses, Tommy! Dinner is nearly ready. It'll give them some time to get to know each other," Dorothy Pickett responded from the kitchen, chiding her husband's worries.

"Merely letting you know." He waited until the boat was halfway across the water before letting himself out and starting down to the jetty. Mustn't let the Owens down, mustn't get any complaints…

oOo

Daphne didn't like the uncomfortable silence of her companions. In an attempt to start a conversation and lighten the mood, she cleared her throat and said, "So…" Great, now they were all looking at her. Well, better say something clever. "I'm Daphne Blake," she finally ended lamely. Scratch the clever part.

The little brunette gave her a friendly smile. "Velma Dinkley." Daphne eyed what the other girl was wearing. The orange turtleneck was okay she supposed, but with the cream cardigan and dull red skirt – down to almost her _knees_! – it gave her the overall appearance of someone who should be behind either a teacher's desk or a library's check-out counter rather than a girl fresh out of adolescence. But she was the first to respond, so, glasses and awful tastelessness aside, Daphne returned the smile. Even had her hair cut to fall just below her chin. Daphne would have to rescue her.

"Jones, Fred Jones," the blonde man said, flashing a cocky grin. Daphne surveyed him. Handsome; maybe she'd go in for him, maybe not. "Pleased to meet you, Miss Blake." She noticed Velma keeping a blank face with some effort.

"The pleasure is all mine," Daphne returned coolly.

The woman from the plane glanced up from her knitting long enough to sniff, "I am Jennifer Morley." Daphne nodded respectfully, earning her a slightly less scornful frown.

"Like, Norville Rogers," the messy-haired man said. Then he returned his attention to the island.

The snorting-dozing man introduced himself as General Bradley Sylvester. Daphne thought he was possibly narcoleptic, but was tactful enough to keep such observations to herself. The neatly groomed blonde woman was Marianne Bower, a registered nurse, and the dog was Scooby Doo. Interesting, she mused. Perhaps the Owens needed more servants than they had let on.

At the shore Velma let the others get off the ferryboat first. Now that she was in no danger of being late, she didn't mind being last. The tired-looking butler reached for her one bag, but she picked it up herself. "It's okay. Do you need any help with the rest of those?"

"Oh, no, I couldn't let you – "

"I can take two more," she offered, pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose. That was all it took. He handed her two suitcases and a purple trunk. Velma staggered up the steep path to the house, but kept her mouth shut. The least she could do was help this poor, overworked man. At the same time though, that irritating little voice in her head was warning that her parents would disapprove.

Oh, heck with them! They were gone now anyway and weren't going to be doggedly criticizing every breath she took now. No more incessant comparisons to her older brother – Trent was her hero, but he wasn't perfect either. The accident proved that.

At the front door she set down the luggage and inhaled deeply. "Something smells delicious," she commented, walking inside while the manservant held the door and quietly assured her he could handle the stairs with the bags.

He smiled. "Yes, my wife has been preparing supper in the kitchen."

"Thank you, …?"

"Pickett. Thomas Pickett," he filled in.

"Thank you, Pickett." Velma smiled and made her way to the sitting room, where the others were already assembled and talking. The only available seat was next to the young man with messy brown hair. Not messy in a bad way, she thought as she hung back in the door way. It looked fairly nice on him.

He looked up and met her eyes. She quickly averted her gaze, suddenly aware that she had been staring. Wonderful first impression. "Come sit down," he said, so softly that she was sure she was the only one to hear. "I promise I don't bite."

She chanced looking up again. He wore a tentative smile. "Is it…do you mind?" He shook his head and patted the empty cushion next to him. Grateful for a friendly gesture Velma slid in next to him. Another rebellious act for her parents to roll over in their graves about. "I'm Velma Dinkley," she introduced herself with half a smile.

"Norville Rogers," he answered, looking almost shy.

"Norville?" She couldn't hide her surprise. "Surely you have a nickname!"

"Like, no," he admitted.

"Then I'll give you one," she decided. Taking in his carefree appearance, she asked, "What do you like? Er, enjoy?" Hopefully the odd 'like's inserted into his speech weren't contagious. She'd have to be careful to watch what she said now.

"Nature," he responded immediately. "Food. Not having to be organized to be myself."

She thought a moment. "What do you think of 'Shaggy'?"

Rogers looked thoughtful. "Shaggy Rogers…I like it! But," he added after a moment, "would you call me that?"

"I – I could, if you wanted me to."

"I meant just you, since you thought of it."

She felt heat creeping over her face. "Of course, Shaggy," she tested it. It fit him perfectly, and he smiled. Then Pickett drew the guests' attention to the gramophone. Rather old-school, Velma noted.

"Mr. Owen has requested his guests be greeted by record," Pickett explained, "but not to worry; dinner shall be ready soon."

"Good, because Mr. Jones over here looks hungry," the redhead – Daphne, Velma remembered – said, eying the blonde man as he slid an arm around her. The rest of the company laughed, with the exception of the older woman. Though, Velma had her doubts that she ever laughed.

Pickett started the player, and a voice that was neither old nor young and neither male nor female began to issue from the gramophone. "Good evening, all. If you are hearing this I have only to assume Pickett is faithfully following my directions. Now, you all received letters of invitation asking you to come to Manse Island for various reasons. About those letters – I lied."

"What?" Jones leapt to his feet in outrage.

"Sit down, Fred Jones." The company sat in dumbfounded silence as the record continued. "And no one should dare to think of leaving. You are all in good company here with these fellow pretenders.

"Yes, you are all here because you all pretend. You pretend to be innocent. You pretended in court and you pretend even now. But here I shall strip you of all pretenses and name the charge for which you are here, why I have chosen you.

"You are all murderers."

"Preposterous!" The scowling woman's eternal frown deepened.

"Jennifer Morley, please silence. Not even you are truly innocent. You all are guilty and you all will pay the price. This record is nearly over, and I leave it to you to confess you guilt before those assembled here. If you do not care to, Pickett will turn the record over and I will read off your charges. In a usual case you would be innocent until proven guilty. In this case, you all escaped the law when there was no proof. But justice will touch her fingers to you yet, for you are indeed, guilty. Confess now." The record ended with the scritch-scratch common of records on phonograph machines.

But all ten were suddenly conscious that this was neither an ordinary record nor an ordinary group of strangers.


	2. Ten Little Indians, Going Out to Dine

"_**Now you'll find to your surprise all the corpses you left behind…" Digging up dead bodies - fun.**_

**Chapter One: Ten Little Indians, Going Out to Dine**

Sylvester was the first to break the silence. "We might as well do as Owen says. Who would like to go first?" He looked from one face to the next. His gaze stopped on the little brunette. Surely her sin would be the least, he thought, since she is a girl and so young. "How about you?" he asked kindly.

A faint smile flitted over her face. "No…you don't want to hear what I've done, not yet."

Silence fell over the parlor like a blanket of fog, pervasive and somehow invasive. At last Miss Blake, the redhead, said flatly, "Turn the record over. No one is going to admit to doing anything."

Jones snorted. "I must be here by mistake. I never killed anyone."

Pickett was fidgeting, Sylvester noticed. "Pickett, the young lady is right. Why don't you turn the record over and we'll hear the alleged crimes from our host."

Pickett started. "Y-yes, sir, if you wish."

Within moments the untraceable voice was speaking again. "You couldn't do it, could you? You couldn't – or wouldn't? – confess to your crimes. Allow me to assist you in this, then; alphabetically by first name. I do so love being on a first name basis.

"Bradley Sylvester, charged with the murder of Andrew Blarkett, the neighbor who had the hots for your wife Angela. You laced his heater with chlorine tablets and then called the police when he didn't answer his phone.

"Daphne Blake, charged with the murder of Richie Townsend, the boy who got drunk on a date and pushed too far. In turn, you pushed him out the driver's side of the car door and watched as he was brutally mangled by automobiles. You then drove his car home and called the police to report him for harassment.

"Dorothy and Thomas Pickett, charged with the murder of Colonel William York, your former employer who never paid you the right amount or on time. Dorothy prepared his medicine and Thomas made sure you had the right amount to just stop his heart without it looking too purposeful.

"Fred Jones, charged with the murder of Robbie and Elaine Philips, the siblings who were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Your car hit them as you were driving one hundred fifty km/hr in a one hundred zone. You were upset over the inconvenience of the bent front fender caused and drove on in total oblivion – or was it unfeeling rather than ignorance, Freddy boy?

"Jennifer Morley, charged with the murder of Evangeline Carruthers, the immoral young girl you met while serving as secretary at Lady Christine's School for Young Women. You were aghast at her actions and slipped some thallium into her toothpaste, convinced you were carrying out the will of God.

"Marianne Bower, charged with the murder of Evan Snyder, the gold-digging boyfriend who dumped you for someone richer while on a walk through the woods. Struck by inspiration, you 'tripped' near the ravine and shoved him over the side, feigning an attempt to save him. The last human sound he ever heard was your voice calling his name.

"Norville Rogers, charged with the murder of Lexie Arnolds, the businesswoman who was unlucky enough to be the only thing standing between your band of environmentalist enthusiasts and keeping that small town's forest whole. You rigged her car's engine to stall at a stoplight, where an oncoming semi crushed the opponent and her car flat.

"Scoobert Doo, charged with the murder of Timothy Brown, the self-centered ten-year-old who never wanted you to help others. His parents were gone on a day trip and you were trustworthy enough to leave with the boy. He wanted to go swimming. All you did was push him in. Never mind that it was the middle of December. Needless to say, he froze to death. The Browns never thought it more than an accident, and certainly never blamed you.

"Velma Dinkley, charged with the murder of Paul and Martha Dinkley, the parents you were never good enough for. After your older brother's death they only worsened; after all, they had never wanted a girl. When you couldn't take it anymore, you disabled the carbon monoxide detector, convincingly broke the heating pipes and left for your grandparents' for the weekend like a good girl. They were dead before you ever arrived.

"So tell me, how does it feel to have your darkest secrets laid bare before others of your kind? Horrid, I'd wager. Enjoy your weekend, criminals. That is, if your conscience doesn't kill you first."

oOo

Dorothy Pickett covered her mouth with her hand. No, not the Colonel, not after all these years! She was nearly able to think of him with no guilt or shame, but it would be a long time before she was that close again. She took a deep breath and put on a smile. Dorothy was good at that. Walking into the sitting room where uncomfortable silence reigned, she called, "Supper is ready!"

The convicted party broke into nervous laughter and chatter as they swarmed their way into the dining room. Dorothy had set the table just as she had been instructed. Eight places were set around the long oak table, each with a glass and silverware. A deep crimson tablecloth, small sprigs of leaves down the center of the table, and a quaint little centerpiece of ten ceramic Indians shielding their eyes as they stood in a circle adorned the elegant table. The group sat down, nonchalantly conversing as if they had not all been just charged with murder. Dorothy suspected that, like her, they would rather not think about it. No sense in dwelling on the past.

Thomas helped her carry out the meal: roast turkey with her special recipe for potatoes and greens. Those gathered ate appreciatively, and their muffled dinner talk could be vaguely heard through the door to the kitchen where Thomas and Dorothy sat dining. "What do you think Owen means to accomplish by assembling a houseful of murderers?" she queried her husband, taking a sip of the claret. "Is he trying to play some sort of game, do you think?"

He shook his head. "I believe Owen wants to see if the psychological admission of guilt will break any of us. I wonder, who do you think his money is on for the first to break? I doubt Jones or Sylvester. Too full of themselves."

"Rogers, perhaps? He seems a nervous fellow. Or one of the young women? Miss Bower seemed unable to speak after her accusal."

"Rogers, maybe. The Blake girl or the nurse, but not the brunette or Miss Morley for certain."

"Why ever not?" Dorothy was surprised. She had thought Miss Morley to be among the first to succumb, taking into account her age. Her stern features might disguise her true age, Dorothy supposed.

"Much too coldblooded. Miss Morley poisoned a young girl with thallium, which takes a long while to do the job. As she worked in the same place that the girl would have been going to school, she would have watched the poison slowly kill her victim."

She shivered and took another bite of turkey. "Oh, Thomas, that's dreadful! But," she sighed, "I suppose not any worse than our killing the Colonel."

"Dorothy, we had to. He was a stingy, miserable old coot," he said gently.

She shut her eyes and shook her head. "But he was kind to us, and never took what we did for granted."

"York was tight-fisted and also never gave either of us a shred of respect. Treated us like dogs, he did. Meet the needs, a pat on the head, toss a bone every so often, but never any respect, Dorothy! We did what we had to do."

She averted her eyes and sipped her claret again. Yes, they did what they had to do. Didn't they always?

oOo

Jennifer dabbed the corners of her mouth with her cloth napkin, surveying the others at the table. Who would have guessed that these seemingly respectable people were all murderers? Hmph. Of _course_ the butler was guilty, it was always the butler, without fail. Always! But the General, the nurse, the two young women, the dog for goodness' sake…well. They were getting what they deserved by having their guilt exposed. God's will was being done by plaguing their hearts and minds.

That Evangeline girl…now, she had been committing fornication, Jennifer knew. As if that weren't bad enough in itself, she prided herself on her sins! Imagine, being proud of such a horrific thumbing of one's nose at the dear Lord! That was why Jennifer had taken her life. All people must die; some simply had to go sooner than others.

Jones leaned over to whisper something to the redheaded girl – Daphne. She blushed and pushed him away. Jennifer's disapproving gaze roamed to Marianne and General Sylvester, talking about the chance of rain for the weekend. Rogers and the dog – Scrooby, like the Plymouth congregation? No…ah, Scooby – were deep in conversation over the meal. At last Jennifer's sharp hazel eyes landed on the only other silent member of the party. Velma met her scrutiny with her own indifferent brown stare. Jennifer raised an eyebrow and said coolly, "Tell me about your parents."

This broke the stare. She dropped her eyes to the table. "They didn't want a daughter. Owen made that plain enough to the rest of you. I think they would have gotten rid of me if it wouldn't have caused such a bloody mess. Literally bloody, I mean. All they ever did was compare me to Trent. He was my hero, but after he died in the accident and couldn't protect me anymore they found ways to daily blame his death on me. Nothing I did was ever good enough for them. I come home with the highest grade in the honors class, they pick out the one mistake in the whole paper and exaggerate it beyond all reasonability. I bring home my report card with a 4.0 GPA, they tell me Trent was smarter than I'll ever be. Gran and Gramps weren't so bad. They didn't come to graduation though. I was the only one left standing on the stage when the parents walked their kids away. The principal had to come up for me." She paused to take a deep breath. "Mom and Dad both had a…tendency for alcohol. When they were drunk I had to hid the kitchen knives so they wouldn't kill each other or me." A trace of a smile lingered on her face. Jennifer found herself coming to the decision that the girl had had a moment of sensitivity to God's will in killing her parents who were so only in name. "I used to be afraid to go to sleep at night."

"I certainly would think so!" Jennifer said indignantly.

"Not for fear of them," she corrected, shaking her head. "Because I knew I would wake up…older. And that meant more knowledge of who Paul and Martha really were, not the perfect parents they pretended to be in front of the rest of the world. That's why I killed them."

Jennifer nodded. "Understandable. They had no business being parents in the first place it would appear." She stood and picked up her empty plate. "I should like to excuse myself now."

"I'm finished too." Velma carried her own plate to the kitchen door and backed it open, holding it for Jennifer. Hm. Polite as well as straightforward.

The Picketts looked up from their small table. "Oh, dear! Is everyone finished? I'm so sorry," Dorothy Pickett cried, bustling about to take the dishes, and she went into the dining room without waiting for a reply. She had looked guilty when Jennifer met her eyes; surely she was feeling remorse. My, Owen was good at getting to people.

oOo

Rogers wandered into the sitting room with the rest of the group. He sat on the couch to observe the others. Velma was reading a poem that was over the mantle, arms crossed. Miss Morley was in a grey armchair, knitting away again, and Sylvester was nodding off on the other couch. Miss Bower was poking at the fire, Jones was leaning against the wall with his claret in one hand, Miss Blake was talking with him, and Scooby was curled up on the ground. No one else seemed as bothered by the record's accusations as he. He fidgeted, watching the fire dance. Lexie Arnolds had said plainly that she would rather have a mall in Mandon than a forest no one would visit, but that part wasn't true. Rogers knew for a fact some of the high-schoolers went there after school frequently; for what reasons he wasn't sure, having never been invited, but he had been adamant about keeping the woods undisturbed. Now, that semi that had crashed into her car –

A choked gurgle from behind Miss Morley's chair drew everyone's attention. Jones was turning blue in the face; his glass of claret dropped and shattered as he swayed and toppled. Miss Blake let out a shriek. "He's dead! He's choked, he's dead, he's dead!" Rogers thought it was odd she should be so squeamish about a virtual stranger swallowing his claret down his trachea or something when she had watched her boyfriend be battered to death on a road.

Miss Bower leapt to her feet and dashed over to kneel beside the blonde man in question. Pressing two fingers to his neck, she waited a moment. "He's quite dead," she determined at last. "Presumably choked on a swallow of too much claret." Miss Blake covered her face with her hands.

"Oh, awful, awful, and I was talking to him too," she moaned.

It seemed Velma was thinking the same thing Rogers was, because she whispered thoughtfully, "She doesn't seem like much of a coldblooded murderer who escaped the law now, does she? Though, I suppose the rest of us just standing here blankly may as well convict us of our crimes."

"Like, that's along the lines of what was going through my head," he responded. She really did seem like such a nice girl, he thought. Then with a jolt he realized the idle thought was directed towards Velma rather than the distraught redhead the others were awkwardly attempting to console. This just kept getting odder.

"I wonder," the brunette beside him mused, looking lost in thought. "Choking…no, no, it isn't possible."

"What isn't possible?"

She looked up in surprise. "Oh, Shaggy, I was just thinking of the rhyme over the fireplace mantle. Childish, I know, but so morbid. Along with other nursery rhymes, it does lead one to understand why society is so twisted nowadays, and why humans are so – so _dreary_ all the time, obsessing over what could ever go wrong and whatnot."

He did often wonder that himself. And oh, that nickname… "Yes, it's clear when you look at it that way, I guess." He turned his attention back to the others. "Did Mrs. Pickett just faint?" The grey-haired woman was lying on the ground and looking pale.

"No, I believe she's taking an impromptu nap," Velma said dryly. "Miss Bower offered to give Pickett some medicine. She's up in her room retrieving it. If you'll excuse me a moment?"

Rogers smiled and took a step back. He liked her sense of humor, he thought to himself. She squeezed her way over to the body, but – what was she doing? She knelt beside the broken glass and began sweeping it up with Mrs. Pickett's dustpan and small whiskbroom. Miss Morley sniffed. "You ought to leave that to Pickett, Miss Dinkley."

She looked up with a slight, almost knowing smile. "I think he works hard enough as it is. The least I can do is clean up when his wife isn't able to."

oOo

Marianne returned to the sitting room with the bottle of Trional for Mrs. Pickett. Poor old woman. She must be seventy-five at least, and the shock would do nothing for any heart conditions. Normally Marianne wouldn't give a sedative to a patient who had passed out, but one so old and suffering from shock required something to calm the heart. "Here," she said, unscrewing the lead and measuring out the proper amount, "this should help." She handed the bottle to Pickett after administering the medication to the unconscious woman. "Can we take her back to your room, or are you not able to move her?"

Pickett jumped and nodded vigorously. "Oh, yes, of course, of course." He tenderly lifted his wife into his arms. Marianne followed him through the dining room and the kitchen to the servants' quarters, where she showed the manservant how much to give Mrs. Pickett if she needed any more. He met her eyes. "Thank you," he said in a trembling voice, "thank you. Dorothy isn't…she never…it was my fault, the Colonel. I suggested it, not her."

Marianne didn't know how to respond to such an open confession. "I…I see," she finally settled on, plastering a smile over her face.

He seemed to regain his composure and realize whom he was talking to. "I'm sorry, Miss Bower. Is there anything I can do for you?"

She shook her head. "Nothing for me. Good afternoon, Pickett."

"To you as well." Pickett returned to his prone wife and the blonde nurse left for the sitting room.

With the rest of the group now, she slipped into a chair and pretended to be attentive to Bradley's predictable, war-centered monologue. Although, no one else seemed to be listening to the long-winded account. Miss Morley was knitting and talking to Miss Dinkley with something less of a frown. Across the room Rogers was chatting with Miss Blake. Marianne did notice, however, that he kept glancing over at where Miss Morley sat in a grey armchair and Miss Dinkley absent-mindedly rocked in the old rocking chair. At Marianne's feet Scooby lay, asleep. So it would be pointless to encourage Bradley, she concluded, stretching and dropping the pretense. "Bradley," she said, "nobody is listening to your stories. I think we're all ready to unpack."

"I, for one, second that," Miss Blake smiled, standing. All trace of tears was gone now, Marianne noted. Then again, they all had to be good at acting to get away with murder.

No, don't think about Evan. He was nothing, he was…he was everything, everything, everything to her. When he'd told her about Julia, she had been devastated. She had lunged forward, screaming – no. She forced herself back to the present and found herself on the landing between flights of stairs, alone. Shaking her head to clear it, she started to climb to the second floor and her room. Enough was enough.

Still… In her room she sat on the bed, staring at the portrait on the wall. It couldn't be! "Not here," Marianne whispered. "You haunt me enough, don't you?" She closed her eyes and let the memory consume her. Maybe this would make it stop at last.

_Evan broke the kiss, eyes sparkling. "Marianne," he laughed. Then a touch of regret sprouted in his expression. "Marianne, I need to tell you something."_

"_Anything!" She had never been happier. The view was spectacular up on top of the wooded cliff._

"_You remember Julia, right?" he began, brushing her cheek with his fingertips._

_Yes, she remembered Julia Harper. "Of course, why?"_

"_She and I are – " Marianne's stricken look stopped him. "No, baby, it's just…I think it's time to move on."_

_To move on. What a horrible phrase, she thought dully. He stood and turned to face the cliff, clasping his hands behind his back. "So you're breaking up with me," she clarified flatly._

"_Yes. I'm sorry, sweetheart," he said, not turning from the cliff._

_Hot tears filled her eyes and devastated rage tightened her fists. He wasn't sorry; this wouldn't be happening if he was sorry. Almost before she knew what she was doing, she flew forward and pushed him. A surprised yell burst from his mouth as he tumbled through the air. Marianne dropped to her knees, his name torn from her lips. "Evan!" He disappeared, and slowly a smile spread over her face._

_It felt good._

_It felt good, she thought vaguely. Interesting._

Marianne opened her eyes. She didn't want to remember any more than that. The next part, when the search parties went down to find his spattered remains, was the worst of the memory, of what she had done. So she pushed away Evan's gentle green eyes, his strong arms and his sweet smile, and she began to unpack. Might as well, the pretty thirty-two-year-old told herself. No sense in lingering in the past.

There never would be, she thought, and she ripped down the portrait that looked like Evan with no remorse.


	3. Nine Little Indians Staying Up Very Late

"_**So sleep tonight, but sleep dreamlessly this time; when we awake, we'll know that everything's alright." **_**Because, of course, you'll awake in heaven.**

**Chapter Two: Nine Little Indians Staying Up Very Late**

In the morning Daphne stretched, her long pale arms arcing gracefully over her halo of red curls as she yawned. She'd gone to sleep later than was usual, and as a result it was just past nine when she awoke. The redhead swung her legs over the side of the bed and stood, pulling a purple night-robe around her and tying it at her waist. Then Daphne made her way downstairs, trying not to think of Freddy. He had seemed nice enough in the short time she had talked to him, and he honestly had seemed to like her.

"Good morning," she greeted the company in the sitting room. Rogers responded by beginning to hum a Beatles song.

Miss Dinkley nodded a greeting and smiled. "Has anyone seen Mrs. Pickett? I think that as we're all awake now would be a good time for breakfast."

Slowly each admitted that neither Pickett nor his wife had been seen all morning. Miss Morley put down her knitting. "I believe we ought to wait," she declared firmly. "After all, the woman had a dreadful shock yesterday. It's natural she should want to sleep in."

Daphne pondered this. "I don't know about you, but my boss wouldn't care if I was sick with the flu and had to sleep in. What you're saying is, if I'm understanding correctly, that we should let an older woman oversleep when she has a job to do?"

Miss Dinkley started. "I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"I said, should we let an old woman oversleep when she's on the job?" Daphne repeated herself, slightly irritated. What was so alarming about that? The other girl's eyes widened behind her glasses and her mouth moved in soundless speech.

"I need to check something," the brunette said abruptly, jumping up and dashing out of the room.

"I'll go with her," Rogers was quick to add, hurriedly darting after her. Daphne blinked in surprise, not quite sure what was going through their heads.

"Am I the only one confused by that?" she asked, looking around.

Miss Bower chuckled slightly. "Oh, you aren't the only one. They'll return presently, I'm su–"

A shriek cut off the blonde nurse. Barely two seconds later Miss Dinkley flew into the sitting room, wild-eyed, and nearly pounced on the plaque above the mantle. "There! There!" she cried, dropping to a cross-legged position on the floor and stabbing a finger at the plaque. "The rhyme…it's coming true…" A strange look clouded her eyes and she looked up, saying formally, "Mrs. Dorothy Pickett will not be joining us today, tomorrow, or ever again. She has overslept herself…and now there are eight."

Miss Bower leapt to her feet. "Er, excuse me, Miss Dinkley, but what do you mean by that?"

"She's dead," the girl on the floor responded matter-of-factly. "Owen killed her. Just like he's killed Jones and is going to kill all of us. With the rhyme and the Indians on the table. 'Ten little Indians going out to dine; one choked his little self and then there were nine. Nine little Indians staying up very late; one overslept himself' – herself – 'and then there were eight.' There are now eight." A wild, inhuman grin spread over the thin face. "He's on the island and we get to be killed the way we killed…"

Daphne took a step back. So this was the Velma Dinkley who killed her own parents, and not the quiet, mousy girl from the day before. Scooby trembled. "Rhis is rustice, roming rack to raunt rus all."

Rogers dropped to kneel by Miss Dinkley, looking worried and a little bit nervous. "Velma, try to think about what you're saying. Like, you aren't acting like yourself."

Miss Morley sniffed as if everything were perfectly clear to her. "She's been diagnosed with psychoneurosis. Don't you have some kind of medication that could help in that big black doctor bag of yours, Miss Bower?"

Miss Bower furrowed her brow. "I don't believe so, I'm not authorized to carry much prescription medicine around, but if she's been diagnosed there should be some in her roo– wait a moment, how do you know that information?"

The older woman waved a hand. "Take care of her first, and then I might tell you all." Miss Bower rushed off to obey.

Daphne sat down, watching the younger girl with absurd fascination. I've never seen a mad person before, she thought. How terribly awful that would be…

Miss Bower returned with a small bottle and shook out a couple tablets, handing them to Miss Dinkley, who took them quietly and said nothing. Then the group collectively waited for Miss Morley to speak. "First," she said with an air of schoolmistressy sternness, "if what Velma says is true, and Owen is indeed on the island, then we are all in the same distressing position and thus should be on a first name basis (save the men; I'm not that liberal) to ease social tension. I am Jennifer, you are Marianne, you are Daphne, she is Velma. You are Rogers, you are Sylvester, the dog is…Scooby…the butler is Pickett. Clear?" Jennifer waited for the nods before resuming. "Now, I know about Velma's condition because I worked as secretary at her school before Lady Christine's. She doesn't like to take the medicine – or, didn't in Years Two and Three. That was when her brother's accident was, the mental stress of which caused this."

Daphne saw Velma's jaw set. "I'm right here still, Miss Morley. You don't have to talk over my head."

Jennifer nodded. "My apologies. I take it the medication has set in?"

Daphne suspected it had, and when Velma relaxed and nodded her suspicions were confirmed. The redhead excused herself and made her way into the dining room to see what had thrown Velma out of whack. "Jeepers," she whispered to herself, eyes widening at what she saw.

The centerpiece on the table now had eight little Indians – and two jagged pairs of broken feet. Two little Indians were missing.

The kitchen door swung open, startling her. "Oh, I'm sorry, miss," Pickett said, looking surprised himself. "I didn't expect to see anyone quite yet."

She forced a smile. "Of course, Pickett. Tell me, is…is your wife…dead?"

Shock leapt into the older man's eyes. "I…well, she isn't waking up, that much I know. I was just on my way to request the assistance of our resident medical expert, Miss Bower."

"Marianne is in the sitting room with the others." Daphne turned on her heel and led Pickett back the way she had come. "Mrs. Pickett is not wakening," she announced to them. "Marianne, we'll need a diagnosis."

Marianne inclined her head and scurried after the butler. Velma crossed her arms from her seat in the rocking chair. "She's dead," she stated calmly. "There's your diagnosis. I may be crazy, but I can spot a fellow lunatic when I see one."

Daphne lowered herself onto the couch. Scooby shook his head. "Raybe rhe risn't. Rit right re ra rick."

"Oh, we can but hope," Sylvester said. "We can but hope."

As it were, Marianne returned without Pickett and delivered the news with an unreadable expression. "Mrs. Pickett has left us." Jennifer crossed herself. "Pickett has humbly offered to prepare meals for us. In the meantime, it would appear Velma has been right so far. Any more predictions?" She turned expectantly to Velma.

Daphne wondered if she imagined the uncomfortable look that crossed her face. "Read the rhyme the whole way through," she intervened. "That seems to be the center of it all, modus operandi if you will." Velma shot her a grateful look, and Daphne returned with a friendly smile.

Sylvester lurched to his feet and plodded to the plaque which had been re-hung over the mantle and read it aloud:

"Ten little Indians going out to dine

One choked his little self and then there were nine.

Nine little Indians staying up very late

One overslept himself and then there were eight.

Eight little Indians, travelling in Devon

One said he'd stay there and then there were seven.

Seven little Indians chopping up sticks

One chopped himself in halves and then there were six.

Six little Indians playing with a hive

A bumblebee stung one and then there were five.

Five little Indians going in for law

One got in Chancery and then there were four.

Four little Indians going out to sea

A red herring swallowed one and then there were three.

Three little Indians walking in the zoo

A big bear hugged one and then there were two.

Two little Indians sitting in the sun

One got frizzled up and then there was one.

One little Indian left all alone

He went and hanged himself and then there were none."

Daphne clapped her hands over her ears, wishing she hadn't suggested it. "Oh, it _is_ frightful!"

"Nothing like the taste of sweet decline," Rogers said grimly.

"Obviously some of these might be prevented," Sylvester mused. "How many of us have been to Devonshire outside of the visit to Marwood in order to get here?"

Reluctantly Daphne raised her hand, along with Scooby, Marianne, and Sylvester himself.

"There is no way off this island, save leaping off Schooner Rock with a sheet and attempting to parachute to shore, until the ferry returns Monday morning. So in lieu of this, I suggest those of us who have been to Devon keep mum about it and keep away from Schooner Rock with sheets. The next possibly preventable death is by bee sting. Who is allergic to bee stings?"

Rogers and Jennifer raised their hands. No one else moved.

"Then, you two, we will scout the island for an apiary to keep you well away from. Next we see a fictional fish swallowing someone; who can't swim?"

Marianne and Velma raised their hands.

"Stay away from the ocean. Frizzling, does anyone have sensitive skin?"

Daphne, Jennifer, and Scooby raised their hands.

"Keep indoors. Whoever is last must not hang themselves!" Sylvester ended triumphantly. "We'll foil Owen's nasty plot yet."

"If we're right about his methods, that is," Daphne pointed out.

"True," consented Sylvester. "I propose a group of scouting parties to search the island for Owen. We can go in pairs – I will go with Miss Bower, Scooby can go with Miss Morley, Pickett will be with Miss Blake, and that leaves Rogers with Miss Dinkley."

oOo

Scooby trotted along behind the grouchy woman, sniffing for any unfamiliar scents. He thought he'd smelled Owen back at the house – the scent from the letter, in any case – but couldn't be certain. There were just so many scents that sometimes they all got tangled on the way to his nose.

"Are you smelling anything?" Jennifer asked a bit stiffly. She had been rather put out at being paired with a dog, Scooby knew, but she didn't have to be so distanced.

He shook his head. "Ruh-uh. Rare you reeing ranyrhing?"

"Nothing." She resumed her brisk walk. The two of them had been assigned the southwest side of Manse Island, though so far their search had been fruitless. "What's that?" The question was intoned sharply enough to cause Scooby's head to jerk up. Ahead the faint trail led the way into what appeared to be an old, abandoned fishing village. "Let's take a look at it, shall we?"

"Rokay." Obediently Scooby followed her into the cluster of weathered wooden houses. Grey with age, the only stone seemed to be in their foundations, if they had any. Doors sagged on their hinges, windows cloudy-brown with dust and dirt were shattered, at best riddled with spidery cracks, and the occasional scratched-out phrase on a rock marked a makeshift gravestone here and there. The wind whistled over the crumbling chimneys and effete thatched roofs, many missing most of the straw which once covered them so cheerfully. Scooby pictured children running and laughing with dogs, goats, and chickens everywhere, the place bustling and alive with activity. Now there would be only the lonely wind in that forsaken village. Only the wind and them.

He shivered and hurried along to keep pace with Jennifer. She was a quick old woman, he'd give her that. She seemed unruffled by the emptiness, only pausing every now and then to check in a shadowed window or creaking doorway for signs of Owen. Finding none, she turned back to her companion. "Any whiffs of him as yet?"

"Ri've got rothing," he confessed. He did like the nostalgia permeating the air, however. It felt as if he were backwards in time, pedaling in reverse while everything off the island flowed on around him. It was a wonderful feeling, exhilarating and terrifying at the same time, as if he could float away, lost in time if he didn't work his mind in reverse to remember who, where, when he was. Scooby struggled to bring himself back to the present. Spotting Jennifer some distance away, he set off at a lope to catch up to her straight-backed form.

As they passed the last lonesome, woebegone grey house Scooby looked wistfully back over his shoulder. It did so remind him of storybook nights back in Devon, in his home south of Exeter. He could picture those orphans they read about living in such a place, along with their cruel caretakers and kindly benefactors who came to the rescue. He could see Timothy leading them all…

No! He shook off the painful weight. Jennifer watched him. "You can ignore pain, Scooby," she said quietly. "But only for so long...only for so long..."

oOo

Sylvester adjusted the hat carefully. If a single bee got in and he could bring it back without knowing, and then Rogers or Jennifer could very well be dead by Sylvester's mistake. "Coming, Marianne?"

She rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. "No thank you, Bradley. I'd prefer to stay right here. How will this help us find Owen, again if you don't mind?"

"It won't necessarily." He licked his lips. "However, honey is always a good thing to have on hand."

"For your sweet tooth?"

"For bribery, my dear," he corrected. "If we have the only honey on the island when the supply Pickett has runs out, why, sugar addicts will be just dying to have some." He chuckled at his own joke.

"That's sick, Bradley," she said disgustedly. "Positively sickening. You do realize Owen could be watching us even now as you scrape honey out of that thing?"

He carefully replaced the bee frame and screwed the lid onto the jar. "If he is, I hope he realizes I've left him none for himself. I suggest we follow the trail further. We may even come across a cave or someplace convenient for Owen to be hiding."

Marianne sighed. "That is what I'm hoping not to find. I'd rather not run into a mad person with murder on the mind."

"Then avoid Miss Dinkley," he advised.

"Bradley! The girl's disorder is a result of severe trauma at an early age. She hardly qualifies as a murdering lunatic like Owen."

"Oh?" Sylvester thought aloud. "Surely it took some logic and planning to off her own mother and father. Some hardheartedness too, I would imagine."

Marianne quieted as they continued down the path, but her eyes did not meet his when she answered. "Didn't we all have to be?"

Blarkett's face leapt into his mind, and Sylvester felt a cold, tight hand grip his throat. "No," he said. "Blarkett wanted Angela. It was only in self-defense that I killed him."

The woman was silent for a moment. Birds chirped nervously as if to fill the silence, and she said softly, "I loved him, you know. Evan. He was everything to me."

Sylvester kicked a pebble and simply said, "If you couldn't have him, nobody could. Am I right?"

"Well enough." After a few more paces she grabbed his arm. "Bradley, what's that?"

He stopped and squinted at the looming dark shape in the fog ahead. "It appears to be another building. Stay here and I will go see what it is."

"No! The next rhyme is 'one said he'd stay there,' remember? I'm going with you," she said stubbornly. He admired that she could think of the rhyme so quickly. She would do well against Owen.

"Alright then, let's go investigate." Sylvester offered her his arm, but Marianne ignored it and set off at a brisk walk. He shrugged. "Suit yourself."

The building turned out to be a shabby, run-down old stable. Sylvester rummaged through every stall, gratefully relieved to find no one. Marianne climbed the ladder just high enough to peer into the hayloft. "Nothing up here," she called down, "except some moldy hay and an old rake. Not nearly enough to hide a person."

"Even Mr. Owen could not have concealed himself in this barn well enough to escape our scrutiny," Sylvester decided. "Beyond this I saw a beach, which is only an open stretch of sand. However, it would be unwise to leave it unchecked. Shall we?"

The blonde nurse nodded. "Yes, Owen could be anywhere." She climbed down and held the door open for him. "Do you believe Owen to be a man or a woman?"

He thought for a moment. "I would say a woman. Both deaths have been poison, correct?"

"Yes."

"And the voice on the phonograph was nearly unisex. In my experience I have only ever known women to be able to perfect such an untraceable voice."

"Then should we call him Ms. Owen?"

"I believe we should keep this to ourselves," Sylvester said, raising a hand to his brow to scan the horizon on the beach. "Owen very well could be as clever as he seems and merely wishes us to believe he is a woman."

"To what end?" Marianne mused aloud.

"Our end," he said gravely. "Our end, and the rhyme's end. For I have a feeling that Owen will not rest until there are none."


	4. Eight Little Indians Travelling in Devon

"_**Restful, like Devon on a Monday, cooling my fingers in the bay – we've been learning a song, but it's a long and lonely blues." **_**Ah, yes, the sweet song of dying in an orderly fashion.**

**Three: Eight Little Indians, Travelling in Devon**

Velma watched quietly as Shaggy sifted through the pile of fishing nets on top of Schooner Rock. He glanced up and caught her eyes, a smile playing over his face. "If it makes you feel better, like, I think you're a good girl."

She couldn't look away. His eyes were teasing, but there was an underlying glint of seriousness. He meant what he said. "You don't care about my…problem?"

"Psychoneurosis? Nah. Some of my best friends are crazy." He stood up and raked his long fingers through his hair, sending involuntary shivers chasing down her spine. "Nice view up here, don't you think?"

She finally tore her gaze from him and instead stared out at the mist-covered ocean. The churning waves and seawater blowing violently into her face were actually calming, she realized. "I like it. The fog just hides the mainland."

"It's strangely comforting to think that we can't see anyone, and they can't see us. Even with a murderer on the island. Does that make me weird?" he asked, as if to himself. He walked forward three steps to come beside her.

"No," she said softly, scared almost to say it. "It just makes you like the rest of us."

"I don't think so." He hesitated a moment, then his hand shyly crept up to take hers. "I think we're different. You were getting rid of persecution, and I was protecting the natural world as it is. The rest of them don't have real reasons – money, jealousy, even annoyance. You see, Velma? We're the odd ones out."

The odd ones out. She could bear being different, again, if he was too. "Why do you suppose Owen brought us here then, if we don't belong?"

"Oh, but don't we? We're just different. We still escaped the law, only we had better motives for committing the crimes we did." Abruptly he turned, letting go. "Here, we've finished our assignment. Sylvester did say we shouldn't – what word did he use again? Oh yeah - like, lollygag, didn't he?"

She couldn't suppress a laugh. "Yes, that's what he said. Was there anything interesting in the fishing nets?"

"You mean besides some surprisingly alive bugs? Not really," he admitted.

They were quiet as they made their way down the weathered path. Velma stumbled along behind Shaggy, trying to keep up with his long-legged pace through the strong wind. A storm must be coming, she thought. I hope it holds off a while before it rains.

Pickett held the door for them and ushered them inside. "A storm is brewing; at best we have an hour or two," he fretted, closing the big oak door against the buffering winds. "The rest of them are in the sitting room if you'd like to join them."

Shaggy went in, but Velma's eye was drawn to something else. Yesterday she hadn't noticed the painting in the hall, but now she realized that it was…curious. It showed a blackened weeping willow tree with a twisted trunk. Beside it a shadow of a man was climbing a ladder to the sky, and in the background skeletons fought each other with fiery swords. On top of the burnt tree was a reddish-brown bird with outstretched wings and a desperate expression, entirely engulfed in flames. A bloodied series of handprints marked the trunk of the tree in the center of the painting, implying that a man had tried to climb it. For what purposes, she wasn't sure. On the ground in front of the tree a man with a torn shirt, presumably the man who had tried climbing the tree, was on his hands and knees, his anguished face turned to the night sky. He was bleeding from a wound in his chest, and sweat poured down his neck. Blood, sweat and…he wasn't crying, she realized. Blood, sweat, and one thing missing. Velma followed the man's gaze up to the sky. With a jolt she realized there were no stars. She shivered at the thought – the heavens with the stars ripped out. What a strange thing to put in one's front hall.

oOo

Scooby crept away as the others talked. He didn't mind the wind; his fur would keep him warm enough. The Great Dane left the house and began trotting down to the jetty. He'd seen a beach there, and he'd thought maybe there would be some starfish to throw back. He didn't notice the figure following a few meters behind him.

Carefully he picked his way down the rocky path to the shore. It was so steep, he thought. Perhaps he could figure out how to get back up later. Cross that bridge when he came to it and all. Down on the beach now, he sat down, finding no starfish, to watch the ocean. The rolling, wild waves looked the way his mind felt. The fishing village had dug up parts of him he hadn't thought to be alive anymore. He found himself remembering Timothy's night spells, when he would hear a whimpering and find the boy curled up on the floor, shaking and unable to wake himself. He could still see the little boy's terrified eyes, wide but unseeing, open but not awake, and when Scooby roused him the hiccupping sobs and whisper of "Thank you, Scooby. You're the bestest." Why did he drown the boy? He was selfish, so selfish, that was the only reason, and he knew it.

"Scooby?"

The quiet, sudden voice yanked him from his thoughts, but he managed not to jump. Scooby half-turned to see the brunette girl with glasses. "Rello."

"Why are you out here alone?"

"Ri ras rust rhinking."

"About what?" Timothy asked a lot of questions, too. Always asking, always inquisitive…

"Rimothy."

"Oh." She quieted and began methodically plucking what little grass there was from the sand. "Was he…nice?"

"Rice enough. Re riked to ray rith roats." He loved his little boats. Ships and pirates were a daily game. "Rhat rabout rou?"

"Me?" She folded the blades neatly. "I don't know. I guess…I guess I'm wondering if there was anything else I could have done, instead of killing them. Told somebody, maybe." She sighed and let the wind blow the stacked blades of grass away. "But nobody would have believed me."

"Rhy rot?"

"Because I'm eccentric. They would have thought it was my psychoneurosis talking, not me." She reached up and tucked some brown hair behind one ear. "But enough about my problems. What was Timothy like?"

Scooby thought for a moment. "Re ras small. Ris race ras rort of rudgy, rand ris reatures rere reasant. Ronde, rue-reyed. Red-raced. Roud, rand ralkative, rery ralkative. Re riked rasking ruestions. Rand…" He hesitated to tell her about the night spells. Why should she have to know the pain of them, barely more than a child herself? But she had asked, and she wasn't shoving the wrongness of his death in Scooby's face. "Re rad right rerrors."

"Night terrors?" There was a questioning tone that implied she hadn't known anyone who got them. "Like what?"

"Re rould ralk rinto rhe ritting room, rometimes reven routside, rand curl rup reaming rand rhimpering. Rit was ry rob to rake him up."

"Oh," she said softly. "I'm sorry, Scooby. I wouldn't have asked…I should have, really. I'm sorry."

He let himself smile for the first time since he waved good-bye to Jonathan. "Rit's okay." She hadn't known, poor girl, about Timothy at all. Curious eyes led to curious questions, then to the solemn silence of knowing. Learning really was a funny thing; one always craved it, but once it was attained one wished it could be undone. Knowledge was a burden, yes, and the young ones always thought it light enough until it was too late. Scooby watched the rollicking waves, and he knew. "Rou rould reave."

"Leave? Why?" She was shredding grass again.

"Rhe rothers rill re rooking ror rou."

"Why me, and not you?" Stubborn child.

"Ri'm rust a rog. Ro on."

"What if Owen – ?"

"Ri'm rot rared." He looked at her. "Ri'm rared of reverything, rut rot row. Rif it's rime, Ri'm ready."

She stood but waited for what seemed like eternity. "I wish I were as brave as you, Scooby. But I'm afraid I'm not. I'm not brave…"

oOo

Jennifer looked up from her knitting when she heard the door open. "Velma! What were you doing out there?"

"Talking to Scooby," responded the brunette, shaking the sea spray from her short hair. "It isn't storming yet."

"You don't need to be running around catching cold in any case," Jennifer said sternly, picking up her needles again.

"Yes, Mother," Velma said with a hint of sarcasm, causing Jennifer to remember suddenly what she had done to her real mother. She came into the sitting room and sat down carefully in the rocking chair. "Where did everyone else get off to while I was gone?"

"They're checking the island one more time," Daphne said, offering a smile. "If they find Owen, Sylvester suggested we lynch him."

The younger girl visibly flinched, paling. "Lynch? The last part of the rhyme though…"

"Well, he won't be hanging himself," Marianne said dryly, "so you needn't worry about the rhyme ending with Owen."

She relaxed. "What if they don't find Owen?"

There was a silence. Finally Jennifer said calmly, "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it, dear. For now, I believe I spotted a Scrabble kit on the mantle under the rhyme if anyone should like to play?"

Marianne and Daphne thought it sounded nice and got it down while Jennifer continued her obsessive knitting. Velma went to fetch a book from the library.

From time to time Jennifer would look up and twist her head around to see out the window. The wind still blew as if it intended to rival the Big Bad Wolf, and there was the occasional raindrop that ended its moment of glory on the pane of glass, but other than that the storm did not break full-force and the men did not appear. She wouldn't admit it, but the woman was beginning to feel uneasy being alone in the house. As the eldest of the group it would be her responsibility to protect the other three should Owen enter, and while her fingers were quick with the needles she doubted knitting needles would offer much protection against a ruthless killer.

At last the door banged open and the three men stumbled in. The tallest of them held a limp figure in his jacket. He staggered into the sitting room and fell to the ground, shaking with tears. Rogers looked up at them and pulled his hood back. He cradled the lifeless body, hiding its head, and choked, "He stayed in Devon…like, Scooby stayed in Devon…"

Velma went white and dropped the book with a thud to the carpeted floor, crouching beside the distraught young man. "Oh, no," she whispered, stroking the dog's dripping velvet ear. "What…how?"

"We found him on the beach," Sylvester said in a calm, quiet tone. "His head has been coshed in with a blunt, heavy object. Presumably he died before the second blow was even begun."

"But…I just…" Velma looked up to meet Rogers' eyes. Each's pain was mirrored in the face of the other.

Jennifer snapped her fingers. "Please, save tears for later. Would anyone care to tell us if Owen was found?" The way those two were situated in such close proximity set off her teacher's instinct. It took all her willpower not to call them out into the hall.

Pickett answered her question. "Owen is not anywhere on the island. Forgive me, but I fear that leaves only one conclusion."

Daphne interrupted with a rose-petal soft voice edged in hard steel. "Owen must be one of us."

The silence was deafening. "Who saw Scooby on the beach?" Sylvester asked. His iron-grey eyes roamed from one face to the next.

"I did," Velma said meekly, looking scared. "He told me to come back to the house."

"So, if no one else will speak, Miss Velma here was the last to speak with Scooby alive?" None of the company moved. Sylvester nodded as if that solved all problems and lit his pipe.

"Or," Jennifer said in a low tone, "she is simply the only one willing to admit to talking with him. I, for one, believe that if indeed Velma was Owen she would be smart enough to keep such information to herself."

"Perhaps you are Owen," challenged Sylvester, "and you're trying to divert suspicion from yourself by defending another."

"Bradley!" Marianne uncrossed her elegant long legs and gave the older man a look. "Tension is what Owen wants. Don't give a killer a knife."

Rogers stood, still cradling the third little Indian. "Velma is not Owen." He sounded so sure that Jennifer almost wondered what had been in his drink that morning. Of course, she told herself, it could have been whatever happened when they searched Schooner Rock and the surrounding area. Together. Alone… The scruffy-haired boy turned and left. His grief-laden footsteps could be heard on the stairs as he carried Scooby's body to the dog's room.

There was an awkward silence. "Well!" Pickett said abruptly, rubbing his hands together, "who would like some dinner?"


	5. Seven Little Indians, Chopping Up Sticks

"_**We chopped through the night and we chopped through the dawn. When he died I was hopin' it wasn't contagious, but I made up my mind that I had to go on." **_**Because sometimes you just have to go on alone.**

**Ch. Four: Seven Little Indians, Chopping Up Sticks**

Rogers lay flopped across his bed, eyes shut. The image of Scooby's crumpled body wouldn't leave his mind. It reminded him so much of when that car had hit Riley. It had been raining that day, too, and he had carried his dog home crying, terrified that Mom and Dad would want to cremate him. They cremated everything that died – just one of the side effects of having pyromaniac parents. He had stood in front of the door, just hugging the dog's soaked, stiff and bloody body to himself, for what had seemed an eternity. At last his father had opened the door, seen him there with face wet from rain and tears, and had looked at the thirteen-year-old boy in sympathy. Mom and Dad had burned Riley's body after he went to bed.

A soft, timid knock interrupted his thoughts. He turned off his music. "Come in?"

The door opened slowly and Velma came in. He sat up and motioned for her to sit beside him. She hesitated, then came over and sat down. "Dinner's ready. Pickett made it." She pulled her legs up to sit cross-legged on the bed. "Did you really believe it? What you said, I mean. About me not being Owen."

"I did," he told her, not taking his gaze off her eyes. "And I still do. You're too sweet to want to kill nine other people for no apparent reason. Besides, I like you too much for that to be true." He grinned teasingly.

She ducked her head, reddening a little. "Who do you think it is, then? If not…the crazy girl who murdered her parents."

"Evil parents who very well might have, like, killed her first," he corrected, gently cuffing her. "I would put my money on Sylvester. He's a strong guy, ruthless, and the first to start throwing suspicion around. This whole thing is being done in the name of justice supposedly, right? He seems like the judge type. It makes sense."

She thought about this. "He does have the right psychological makeup that would appear to fit Owen." With a sigh her chin dropped into her hands. "I wish I'd stayed with Scooby."

"I'm kinda glad you didn't!" he retorted, moving closer and tipping her head up. "If I'd had to see Scooby dead…and you too…" He couldn't finish. He sat back, shaking his head. "You know the next part of the rhyme? Chopped in halves!" He didn't even want to imagine her killed like that.

"But he might have left us both alone if he saw there were two," she protested. "Shaggy, what if it's my fault he's dead? I could have brought him back with me at the very least." She looked so guilt-ridden and pitiable that he couldn't help himself. He pulled her into his arms and began rocking back and forth with her. Her head tucked under by instinct, though he felt her tense as if a little bit afraid of him.

"He wouldn't have come, Vel. 'One said he'd stay there.' Scooby wouldn't have come. Owen wouldn't have let him. It isn't your fault."

"Another Indian is missing from the table." Her voice was muffled by his shirt. "Pickett volunteered to lock the dining room tonight."

"I doubt a lock will keep out Owen." He exhaled. "What we need is a face for the unknown killer."

"Dinnertime!" They jumped apart at the sharp voice and twisted around to see a very displeased Jennifer Morley in the doorway, frowning deeper than usual. "Hardly appropriate behavior, Rogers. Please realize that this is neither the time nor the place for philandering." She spun on her heel and briskly clicked away.

"I'm sorry," he began, but Velma shook her head.

"I shouldn't be…in here. It's my fault." She slid off his bed and hurried to the hallway, head down.

Rogers closed his eyes and fell back onto the bed. Why now for him to start feeling like this, now with impending death? Why her, as she put it, "the crazy girl who murdered her parents"? He didn't know. He didn't know anything except that every time she smiled at him with those shy brown eyes his heart sped up, aching inside him. He stood to get ready for dinner and began humming the song he had turned off. "I went down and I fell, I fell so fast/Dropping like the grains in an hourglass/Never say forever 'cause nothing lasts/Dancing with the bones of my buried past…"

oOo

Pickett watched from the kitchen doorway while the other six ate the meal he had prepared. He had painstakingly followed every scrap of advice he could remember from Dorothy. Ah, his Dorothy. It was probably for the better she wasn't here to see all the pain and heartache being caused. Marianne and Sylvester were talking in low voices at one end of the table. Daphne and Jennifer sat in the middle, one on either side and Daphne purposefully one seat to the left of being directly across from the older woman, silent as if they were sworn enemies. At the other end of the table Rogers was quietly discussing something with Velma.

He had always hated tension. He was half-tempted to scare them all and shout, "It's me! I'm Owen!" What a ruckus that would cause. He disappeared into the kitchen to eat his own dinner. He was good at disappearing. At least eating might relieve the tension that stretched the air taut.

Pickett sank into the chair, resting his forehead on his palm. He wished he hadn't pulled Dorothy into this. He hadn't intended her to find out in the first place. But she had found out. She never wanted to kill the Colonel, but he had said she must. Oh, what a horrid dolt he was! He wouldn't let her confess at the inquest, either, and so they had gotten off scot-free.

Thunder startled him from his self-mourning, bringing him back to reality. "They'll be finished presently," he muttered aloud. "Must clean up, mustn't we, Dorothy? Yes, yes, must clean up after the guests."

In the dining room Sylvester was inspecting the Indian centerpiece. Now that there were seven left everyone was wondering where they were going, but none of the company would admit to taking them. "Ah, Pickett! my good man, do you have a handwritten note from Owen? I was hoping to compare it with all of us assembled here, and perhaps we can end this uncanny business with no further deaths."

"I do," Pickett replied quietly. "Mr. Owen said not to show his instructions to any of his guests, however."

"Well, like, I think we have a right, since he's trying to kill us and all," Rogers said, looking to the others. "I wouldn't mind writing something to prove my innocence."

Pickett bowed his head submissively and went to the servant's quarters to retrieve the note in question. As he took it from the night-table, his pale grey eyes fell upon the still body of his wife and sadness flitted over him. Oh, Dorothy.

At Pickett's return, Sylvester took out a pen. "See here," Daphne said suddenly, "don't you think we're leaning a little much on supposition? Not all of us agreed."

"It doesn't matter, Daph," Velma said tiredly, resting her cheek in one hand and taking out a pencil with the other. "We'll do it anyway. Only the guilty party would refuse to give the analyst a sample."

"Does anything matter anymore?" Marianne murmured, drawing a pen from her pocket. "Nothing would, it seems."

And so each complied. Pickett too contributed a sample of his sloping, spidery script. Sylvester passed the original around the table, but no one could tell anything about it until it reached Velma. The girl furrowed her brow and adjusted her glasses, studying the neat handwriting. "It looks right-handed to me. A very organized and compartmentalized mind, I would think?"

"What makes you say that?" Jennifer snatched the note and stared at it. "I can't tell a left-handed person from a right-handed one, much less stereotype their brain from writing."

"It's evenly spaced and perfectly upright," explained Velma patiently, "as well as small and careful, very clean and legible. The hand dominance can be told by the smudges of ink. There aren't any as a left-handed person would leave, you see?" She held her own pencil to the paper and pantomimed writing to demonstrate. She herself was right-handed, Pickett saw. He had to admit, when she took her medication she was smart.

"Then let's compare now," Sylvester said. He arranged the samples in a circle around the original. "This one looks to be a match." With barely any time to consider he tapped a sample – with neat, even, upright and unsmudged handwriting.

"Forgive me, sir," Pickett began in his soft voice, "but it looks too small. And the top of the 'e's are more pointed in the sample than in Owen's."

"It is the closest though," Marianne agreed.

Jennifer hesitated to offer her opinion for once. "It does appear to match more closely than the other six," she said, "but Pickett is most inarguably correct."

Daphne and Rogers agreed. Velma dropped her head onto her arms, looking terrified and resigned. "It isn't me, I promise," came the muffled plea.

Pickett knit his brow. "What do you mean to say?"

"The sample is hers," Jennifer said calmly, picking up her unidentifiable knitting project once more. "But I don't believe she is Owen for a moment." The hazel eyes slid slyly over to Pickett. "After all, it's always the butler, isn't it?"

"Why, I - !" He squeezed his mouth shut into a thin line. "I beg your pardon, Miss Morley, but haven't we set all stereotypes aside by now? The spinster is, if you want stereotypes, quite typically the most devious-minded, is she not?"

Jaw set, Jennifer's fingers deftly began another row. "And typically the war veteran has an attack and goes on a killing spree."

Sylvester's nostrils flared. "If we are going to go by insanity, why don't we take another look at the evidence, shall we?"

Velma stiffened. "I wouldn't - !" She shook her head in defeat, most likely remembering her parents, and pushed her chair back from the table, leaving the room with a stony silence.

"She wouldn't." Pickett wondered if this was ordinary confidence Rogers exhibited in her or if he had another reason for being so certain. No! Mustn't let Owen mess with the mind like that. Rogers looked at Marianne, one eyebrow raised. "Weren't the first two deaths, like, poison? Doctors and nurses know a lot about poison. And Mrs. Pickett was on whatever drugs you gave her, right?" Pickett cringed at the mention of Dorothy.

Marianne's mouth fell open. "How dare you! I am under oath to protect life, not take it!"

"Tell that to your boyfriend," Daphne said under her breath, keeping her eyes on her lap.

The blonde woman's bright eyes blinked rapidly. "If I recall correctly it was always the pretty one."

"So it was," the redhead said coolly, "but who began this 'blame game'?" She turned her eyes accusingly to Jennifer. "I'm sure you were a handsome woman in your time, which qualifies you as both 'the spinster' and 'the pretty one,' so according to this ridiculous pigeonholing you would be Owen. Of course, we all know typecasting is overrated and Owen is enjoying the hostility and accusations, don't we? Which is why we are stopping." She sat back and crossed her arms in satisfaction.

Well, Pickett thought, it would seem we have another level head among us in an unlikely disguise.

oOo

Velma stared out the glass doors without really seeing. Her head swam with all of the past two days' events – Owen, murder, Miss Morley, her parents, Shaggy. Why did nothing make sense? It was like the painting downstairs: bizarre and mystifying, yet queerly entrancing. It reminded her of working puzzles when she was younger. The pieces she needed were always right there, but she could never fit them together until she looked at the puzzle from another angle. The problem was, _was_ there another angle to look at this from?

Owen. Murder. Miss Morley. Her parents. Shaggy… Her thoughts orbited, revolved, wheeled, whirled. Owen. Murder. Miss Morley. Paul and Martha shouting, slurring, throwing bottles as a wide-eyed little girl stared down from crouched behind the balustrade, scared to death they would remember her upstairs. Shaggy holding her, promising it would be okay until Miss Morley appeared in his doorway and brought all that guilt and shame that came with realizing one had been sitting on a boy's bed in his room.

Phoenix. Willow. Fire. Shadow climbing Jacob's ladder when there was no end. A man bleeding and sweating but not able to cry. The heavens with the stars ripped out. Bloody handprints on a twisted burnt tree.

A particularly violent wave crashed against the island, making her jump. She stood and walked to the door, slipped out onto the balcony and leaned over the rail. What would it be like to drown? That was in the rhyme. Maybe she would get to find out. Who would die next, she wondered? Chopped in halves. Vertical halves or horizontal halves? Vertical was more visually appealing, being symmetrical, but horizontal would take less time. She shook her head, blowing out. "Stop it," she whispered aloud. Death wasn't ever beautiful, enjoyable or something to be toyed with. It was last resort, it was extinguishing an existence, it was a hungering fire that scoffed souls daily. So why, if it was so bad, did people enjoy it? Why did some ghouls love it, imagine it, relish it, doodle it, write it, sing it, watch it, even make it happen?

Death was a terrible thing. She knew this. She also knew that deep inside, because she had caused it, this made her terrible too. She could have laughed then. Owen had a sense of humour after all – subjecting terrible people who had done terrible things to a terrible end with a terrible plot to top it all off. It was just…wonderful.

Velma pulled herself from her thoughts and went back inside her room. She really should go back downstairs, but what if they caught her sneaking out? They'd lynch her as Owen for sure. Well, that was one risk she wasn't afraid to take. It'd save Owen the job. A twinge of uncertainty pricked her heart. Shaggy's words echoed in her mind: "If I'd had to see Scooby dead…and you too…Chopped in halves!" No, she wouldn't get caught. She could be quiet, go unnoticed. It had worked in school, hadn't it?

Downstairs the others had once again gone their separate ways. "Velma!" She whipped around to see Daphne reaching for a jacket. "You shouldn't go out alone. It's not safe."

"On the contrary. As long as I'm alone I'm perfectly safe," Velma pointed out, and she slipped away before the other girl could respond. She hurried down the path toward the fishing village Miss Morley had told them about. Maybe there would be something useful there. Sylvester had mentioned a parachute, she remembered, and if she timed it right a leap off Schooner Rock could – could being the operative word – take her back to the mainland. Of course, the wind would have to be strong and in just the right direction, but she was light enough that it wouldn't have to be unbearably hard.

She looked up at the clouded grey sky. Then again, there was always the chance that the wind wouldn't be blowing northeast before Owen decided it was her turn.

In the village the wind seemed louder. Shivering, she pulled her cardigan tighter around her and slowly lowered herself onto the ground beside a mossy stone cross. The gravestone had no inscription, but a small business-sized card lay underneath it. Curiously she picked it up and turned it over to read it aloud to herself. "If you have found this card there may be something in the cellar for you. Tell No One and trust No One, for No One is your friend and Everyone is your enemy. –U.N. Owen." She squinted at it and mused, "U.N. Owen? Or unknown? Mr. Unknown, Mr. Owen, whatever your name may be, who are you?" She tossed the card behind her and exhaled in frustration, dropping her chin into her hands.

The comment about the cellar had piqued her interest though. How she hated herself for wanting to know what Owen had there. For all she knew he could be waiting with a knife to carry out the next of the rhyme! In the end, the blistering gale decided for her. She bit her lip as the stirred up dust stung her eyes, and got to her feet, still holding the cardigan to herself, and began searching for the cellar.

oOo

Sylvester's fingers drummed on the pool table. "Marianne, are you going to make a move today?"

"Hold your horses, Bradley; I'm strategizing." She quirked a smile and shot at the cue ball. The eight, five and twelve went in. She leaned on her cue stick with a self-confidant smirk. "Are you going to make a move today?" she mimicked.

Before he could respond Daphne appeared in the doorway of the games room. "Have either of you seen Pickett?"

Marianne shook her head immediately. Sylvester pondered the question. "I believe he went out to get some wood from the shed. Why?"

"Oh, good. The fire's running low. I'll go see if he's hurrying; he hasn't been in the house for a while." She disappeared again.

Sylvester raised an eyebrow. "Do you think that's safe, Marianne?"

"I think she'll be fine. Unless…"

"Unless what?"

"Well," she said slowly, "Jennifer was right in saying it's always the butler. What if life is following fiction and the butler did it?"

"I'll go after her," Sylvester sighed, setting down his cue stick. "Time-out until I return." Marianne said she'd wait, and the old general set out of the house to the shed.

A choked scream quickened his pace to a panting run. His worn-out brown shoes slapped the muddy path, and he struggled to make out Daphne's form through the pelting rain. At last he spotted her, a still figure frozen in front of the wood pile.

"What is it?" Sylvester came up beside her, breathing hard from exertion. Wordlessly she pointed to one end of the pile, then the other. Sylvester followed her finger with his eyes and swore. "Either the man's grown a good four feet or Owen's struck again," he said with a grim little smile.

"Is it my fault?" Daphne whispered, not taking her eyes from the head of the butler's body. "I asked for some wood from the fire. 'Seven little Indians chopping up sticks,' wasn't it? Well, he's been chopped in halves alright."

"No," he said, "it isn't your fault, unless you're Owen."

"What reason have you to believe I'm not?" she retorted bitterly, clearly still remembering the all the shifting of guilt that had occurred earlier. Then with a sigh, "If we don't get out of here I daresay we'll all end up mad or dead."

"Preferably mad."

"I would rather be dead than mad," she said fiercely. "Because if you're mad, who cares for you? At least if you're dead you have mourners. No one loves a mad person." The unspoken exception hung in the air like so much humidity. Daphne spun on her heel and walked back to the house, straight and tense.

Sylvester was silent, and he studied Pickett's body with a kind of solemn necessity. Marianne would have to see, of course; but perhaps he could spare the others the sight. Pickett lay with his arms flung up beside his head as if in a last pleading for mercy. The head was turned to the side, the paper-thin cheek resting on the soggy grass. His lifeless pale eyes seemed to stare at Sylvester, seeming to say, "Ah, old chap, you aren't so good at protecting people as you would have them believe, are you?" The mouth hung slightly open, and the thin white hair clung to the scalp with a ferocity lended it by the rain, giving the dead man a hollowed, almost childlike appearance. His lower half at the other end of the pile, too, was sprawled. The man's shoes were haphazardly tossed on top of the wood pile, but his stockinged feet were whole.

Sylvester sighed and ran his thick fingers through what little hair he himself had left. "Oh, Owen, you evil puppeteer. Who might you be?"


	6. Six Little Indians, Playing With a Hive

"_**Ladybug pine tree to mingle with the bumblebee…" **_**Mingling with bees? With stingers still attached? Not a wise decision there…**

**Ch. Five: Six Little Indians Playing With a Hive**

Rogers looked up when Daphne stormed in, obviously ruffled about something. Somehow he doubted it was the weather she was acting so much like. With a curt nod in his direction she swept up the grand staircase, presumably to her room. Sylvester entered shortly after, dripping with rainwater. "Pickett's dead," he announced. "Gather everyone to the sitting room, will you, Rogers? That's a good lad," and he vanished to find the others.

Rogers stood and thought a moment. Jennifer was sure to be in her room; she had claimed feeling ill. Sylvester would find Marianne, and Daphne had just gone upstairs. That left only Velma. He thought she'd be in the library, and walked through the games room to the library door. He paused with his hand on the knob. He was sure of himself, wasn't he? Then why, he wondered, did he feel so odd about libraries? Was it merely this one? But it wasn't, and he knew it. His parents' grinning faces shadowed by flames stole him away to another library in another time. He shook his head – this library wasn't burning down anytime soon – and opened the door.

Just as he'd thought, there stood Velma sliding a book back onto the shelf. She turned her head in surprise at the sound of his footsteps and the squeak of the door, removing her glasses to wipe the fog from them. "Yes?"

He blinked. Why should her glasses be fogged up unless… "It's, like, me. Sylvester wants all of us in the sitting room."

"Why?" She continued to clean the lenses with the hem of her cardigan.

"Pickett's dead."

The glasses hit the floor with a clatter. She dropped to her knees and began searching for them, her words spilling over each other. "You aren't joking, are you? Pickett's dead; chopped in halves, he must be, the rhyme – Sylvester found him, I suppose? I'm so sorry, I'm not usually this cack-handed – "

He suppressed a smile and walked over to pull her to her feet, retrieving the glasses for her in doing so. "Here. Don't worry about it," he told her, interrupting her protests; then, reversing the subject, "There can't be many people who've been outside recently." This caused her nearly to drop the glasses again, but she only nodded and slid them on a bit shakily. Rogers had said that casually, but part of him was put on high alert by her jitters. Had medication been a tad off, or was there another, darker reason?

No! This was Velma, she was too – too _nice_ to be Owen. He shook his head to clear it and followed her into the sitting room, where the others were already assembled. He'd just wanted to help conserve the island's wildlife. Now it seemed the only thing running wild was death.

Sylvester stood, lighting his pipe, and turned to face the company with a serious look on his face. "I am afraid that, as you may be aware, Pickett is dead. He was indeed 'chopped in halves,' and he was indeed 'chopping up sticks.'"

"Bradley," interrupted Marianne, "the next part of the rhyme is playing with a hive. How do you propose stopping that? After all," she added with a flash of suspicion in her eyes, "aren't _you_ the only one who has 'played with' a bee's hive as of yet?"

He was, rather oddly, calm at the accusation, "Indubitably I am, Marianne my dear."

Jennifer recoiled. "Sylvester!" she reprimanded, looking horrified. "Have you forgotten that you are the one who suggested trying to prevent the deaths? A foolhardy action such as that - !"

Rogers saw Daphne squirm uncomfortably at the word 'deaths.' "What is it?" he asked her.

Her eyes darted from his face to the fire. "Dead bodies don't move," she whispered.

Puzzled looks were exchanged. "I should hope not," Velma said thoughtfully, "and if they did I would think they weren't so dead after all. What makes you say that?"

"Freddy is in the screening room," confessed the redhead.

In an instant Marianne was gone, Sylvester close on her heels. Rogers blinked. "You're, like, kidding, right?"

"I wish I was!" she burst out. "It's awful; his eyes are open and staring, staring, as if he were watching a film, but there's not a film, just a bloody axe and handprint!" Panting now, Daphne sank back against the couch.

"Well, you needn't swear," Jennifer said primly, setting down her knitting to take a sip of now-cold tea. "Could use some more sugar," she muttered to herself.

"I wasn't swearing, the thing was dripping with it. Pickett's blood, I mean."

"And why his?" Velma asked.

"Who else's? It's an axe," Daphne said as if she was talking to a child, "and you chop things with axes. Like people. Chop, chop."

"But the handprints?" she said doubtfully, ignoring the derisive tone of voice.

"A left one on the blade, likely Owen's."

Rogers stiffened. "Shouldn't we go look then? It'd tell us something, wouldn't it?" His stomach twisted up on itself at the thought. The last thing he'd like to see would be a bloody handprint on an axe – the gory sight would haunt him, he just knew it. So he was relieved when Daphne hugged herself and shook her head vigorously.

"No, I don't want to see the frightful thing again," she whimpered. "The eyes staring at the axe, it was so terribly gruesome! No, I won't go."

Sylvester and Marianne returned. "What's that?" Sylvester queried, shooting a glance at the poem.

"The image of the bloody axe in the screening room scared Daphne half to death," Jennifer told them.

Marianne's brow knit. "There isn't an axe. The screen is blank. There was film in the projector, but no bloody axes."

"Who went into the room first?" Heavy silence followed Velma's question. Even the storm seemed to get muted. Rogers could almost taste the stillness.

He hadn't known silence to taste like corn on the cob drizzled in melting chocolate.

Marianne's face gave away the answer. "Bradley did," she said slowly, turning to the older man. "Bradley?"

He closed his eyes. "There was not a thing on the screen when I entered. Marianne was a mere few steps behind me. That does not allow nearly enough time to change the films out, as it is a regular projector."

"Are we really so petty as to fall back into the blame game again?" Daphne said suddenly. "It doesn't matter now that it's gone, so long as it is gone. As it were, I will be in my room until you can all just grow up!" And with that she stood and left.

Not a word was spoken for a long while, and the only sound was the ironically content crackling of the fire. Then Jennifer announced that she ought to be heading to bed, for she was still feeling ill, and if the others had any sense at all they would do likewise. After she was gone Velma rose and left for the upstairs level without a sound. This broke the stillness of the diminished group, which quickly dispersed amid excuses of how late it was and the like.

As Rogers turned out his light and rolled onto his side to sleep, a thought crossed his mind. _Tomorrow is the last day before the boat returns…_

oOo

Jennifer awoke to find, much displeased, that her intolerable headache was still tormenting her. The woman groaned and pressed the heel of her hand firmly to her forehead, praying silently over her pain. It almost seemed to increase rather than recede, so she dragged herself from bed and put on her dressing gown over her pyjamas.

Taking out her Bible, she opened to Psalms for her daily Scripture reading and spoke the words aloud. "My heart is sore pained within me: and the terrors of death are fallen upon me. Fearfulness and trembling are come upon me, and horror hath overwhelmed me." She stared at the page, her gaze sliding down from verse five to verse eight. "I…I would hasten my escape from the storm and the tempest. Destroy, O Lord, and divide their tongues: for I have seen violence and strife in the city. Day and night they go about it upon the walls thereof: mischief also and sorrow are in the midst of it. Wickedness is in the midst thereof: deceit and guile depart not from – "

With a strangled cry she found she could not continue out loud. Her eyes were drawn down to verse fifteen, which she read silently, having been stripped of speech. "Let death seize upon them, and let them go down quick into hell: for wickedness is in their dwellings, and among them."

For the first time in a long time tears streaked down Jennifer's normally stern face. "No!" she screamed, turning pages desperately. "Lord, forgive me! Forgive me! I repent, I repent!" Everywhere she looked words of forthcoming death and judgment leapt out at her. At last she stopped in the gospel of John. "I repent!" The words of Christ struck her full in the face. "'And ye shall know the truth,'" she whispered, fingers caressing the page, "'and the truth shall make you free.'"

And Jennifer knew.

Had Christ not said, "do not judge lest ye be judged as well"? Had she not judged Evangeline Carruthers in killing her? She had sinned.

Jennifer Morley had sinned. It had taken a rhyming murderer, an isolated island, and her own beloved King James Bible to get it through to her. She vowed to refrain from judging another again…

…if she could just get off this island alive.

Downstairs it seemed she wasn't the only one still tired. "Like, I *yawn* made breakfast since Pickett's, uh…"

"Dead," Daphne said matter-of-factly, spooning a portion of her oatmeal into her mouth.

Marianne looked about to fall asleep at the table. Jennifer hoped if she did and landed in her bowl none of the porridge would make much mess. Only Sylvester appeared to be even remotely alert. "We only have today before the ferry master returns to take us back," he tried to reassure them. "Surely the six of us can live that long?"

Or can we? It wasn't said aloud, but it was evident in each pair of eyes. Slowly the mutual gaze was broken as one by one they looked away, unsure of whom to trust.

After a socially uncomfortable breakfast the six drifted apart. Jennifer surreptitiously watched to see where the other five would go as she rummaged through her knitting kit. Sylvester and Marianne went back into the games room to continue pool. Jennifer disliked pool and thought the blonde woman was being very brazen in making advances towards a man old enough to be her father. Sylvester shouldn't be encouraging her, she thought crossly. This whole sinning business certainly wasn't helping her headache.

Now, if she could just find the right yarn…

A thud from the library made her heart leap in fear. What was going on? She hurried into the other room to find –

– nothing.

No one was there. She shook her head. "You're getting on, old girl. Imagining things," she said to herself, turning to go. As she did so, one shelf on the wall caught her eye. The books were all dusty, 'all' meaning there was one that was not. For what could have been eternity, or only a moment, or anywhere in between, she stared at the undusty book. The Way to Where You Are, by Jess Crossing. "Never heard of it." Still, it wouldn't hurt to see why it wasn't the same as the others. Even as her gnarled fingers closed around the spine, Jennifer tried to convince herself Velma probably was reading it. Where was the girl, anyway? Everyone was always disappearing around here. She tugged on the book, expecting a bookmark to fall out of it or something else to tell of some recent reading.

Instead the bookshelf swung inward with a faint creak. The woman stumbled back in shock, letting go of the book as she did so. It closed again with the thud that had first alerted her to something amiss in the library. Hurriedly she went to the glass door and opened it, spotting a familiar head of perfect red hair.

"Did Velma come along this way?" Jennifer asked, hearing the demanding tone in her own voice.

Daphne looked up from straightening a geranium. "No. At least, if she did, she's been completely silent about it."

She could see that. Though, it was far more likely the girl had found the bookshelf trick and used it to sneak away. But why? A horrible thought hit her. It was probably that confounded Rogers boy, she thought, closing the door back and remembering the scene she had interrupted. She disliked any man who would take a girl into his room and sit in such close proximity to her. On his bed, too. What a devil's assistant.

In the small room behind the bookshelf, which had nearly swept her out again upon releasing The Way to Where You Are, these sour thoughts drifted away as she realized the door in front of her was locked. By whom? Velma? Did she suspect someone would follow her, or did she merely lock it out of habit? Or, Jennifer reasoned, it could have locked itself. She would just have to unlock it. Unfortunately, she hadn't the slightest notion of how to pick a lock. She jiggled the handle uncertainly, eying the numbered keypad with venom. As expected, nothing happened. She glared at the door for a long while, and at last her determination got the best of her. She explored the room for something that would help her open the door. A crowbar would be helpful, preferably one that came with an instruction manual on how to use it for door opening. The closest she could come was a hammer. Wedging the curved claw between the door and the frame, she strained to pry it open. Ten straight minutes of this and Jennifer had to stop, sweat dampening the underside of her tight bun on the nape of her neck. "Ahh," she moaned wearily, tossing the hammer to the floor. "Let her die. What do I care?"

oOo

Daphne filled a glass with water. The gardening had taken her mind off of Owen – at least until Jennifer had poked her head out and asked in a voice verging on panicked if Velma had come by. That shattered her pretense of normality like a thin window. Sipping from the glass, she brushed the lacy curtain to the side in order to peer out the small window over the sink. She secretly hoped Sylvester was coming back from his jog. He had come by the patch of flowers, not even worth calling a garden, fuming and brooding over losing the pool game to Marianne and grumbling that he was going for a jog to wind down.

She wondered if he had passed out from exertion. After all, he was fairly overweight, and not exactly the youngest of them.

"Whatcha looking for?" Daphne turned to see Marianne leaning against the kitchen island with one hand. In the other she held a glass of wine, and one carefully penciled eyebrow was raised over a smirk.

She let the curtain fall back into its rightful place. "Sylvester isn't back from his run," she admitted. What she wouldn't admit to was that she felt a little nervous after the moving-body scare and that she'd feel better with an army general in the house.

"He's running?" The woman suppressed a laugh. Holding up the nearly empty glass, she said, "Bradley doesn't _run_. Lurches or lumbers, yes; runs, no." She tipped up the glass and finished off the white wine. "He's too _fat_," spat Marianne.

Daphne's shock showed plainly on her face. "Then why are you always flirting with him if that's the way you feel?" She left out the part about being a grasping gold-digger like that boyfriend she seemed so remorseful over.

This time the blonde outright guffawed. "Flirting with Bradley? No! I'm his – "

The word she started to say began with either 'n' or 'm'; there was no way to ascertain which because she was interrupted by the door swinging violently open. Sylvester stood there, red-faced and panting from his run. "It's – it's – hurry!" he gasped out.

Marianne's glass rattled where she tossed it in the sink, and both took off after the old general. Daphne got a sick feeling in her stomach when she saw where he was leading them.

The apiary.

"Rogers or Jennifer?" she called to the wheezing man. He couldn't respond, only slowed, doubling over and holding his side, and pointed. She had to look away.

The nurse dropped to her knees beside the body. A few moments later she confirmed that Rogers was dead. "Nasty rashes all over," she said, sobered by the latest death. "My guess is dead within seconds of the first sting."

"The first?"

"There are three sting marks. One on the back of his neck, one on the right side of his chin along the jawline, and a particularly ugly sting is swollen on the back of his upper left arm."

She shivered. "Jeepers."

Sylvester stretched, looking thoughtful. "Rogers wouldn't willingly come out here alone. Either he was forced…"

"…or coerced," finished Daphne. "And who is the only one of us we know he would trust?"

The three of them said her name together. "Velma."

oOo

Marianne's fingers flitted with the yarn she had taken from Jennifer's basket, idly knotting it together whilst the others searched for the AWOL member of their company.

"No!"

The yell of protest made her look up. Her fingers caught and in panic she saw she had knotted together a miniature noose. Quickly she stuffed it into her pocked and rose to her feet as Bradley brought Velma in with her arms held behind her back, bent over in effort to resist. Marianne gave him a look that showed clearly what she thought of his typical military-prisoner approach to the matter at hand. Jennifer and Daphne followed him into the sitting room, the former tutting nervously. "Bradley," Marianne said gently, "this isn't war. Stop scaring her out of her wits and act civilized, will you?"

Reluctantly he released her and sat. Velma instantly put a good meter or two between them and looked warily from one face to the next.

"There. Isn't this much better?" As she talked calmly she settled into the armchair again. "All five of us left alive in one room to discuss what's what and try to discover 'whodunit.'"

"But Shaggy isn't h-" Velma stopped. "He's dead, isn't he?" she asked quietly. No one answered. It wasn't necessary. "And you think I did it?"

Again, thought Marianne, response would be unnecessary when she knew perfectly well what they thought. "We don't want to jump to conclusions," she began.

"Then don't." Funny how simple everything was to her. If only this whole Owen mess was as simple as she made it sound.

"Show them where you were." All four turned to look at Jennifer, whose tight voice was uncharacteristically high. "In the library."

"You know?"

"Only that you were in the library," Jennifer said, "and then you weren't. And Daphne here stated you didn't come by that way, which is the only exit from the library that we know of."

"Stated, did she? Wrote up a formal document to go with it, I'm sure," Velma said wryly. "Well, if you're so intent on seeing it, follow me."

Jennifer gripped her arm. "I wouldn't be talking that way if I was in your position," she warned. Marianne could almost see the metallic glint underlying the woman's voice.

The girl smiled back, unruffled. "You aren't, though, and I am. You see?"

Daphne laid a hand on both of them. "Calm down," she commanded. "We don't need to be at each other's throats at every little thing. Now," her voice softened, "do you want to show us or is it something…personal…?"

Marianne tried not to think of the relationship with the dead man when Daphne said 'personal' like that.

She shook her head. "I can show – wait." Velma turned away with her head bent as if reading something. Finally, "What do I care?" she muttered. "He killed Shaggy…" She turned back. "Come on."

Marianne swiped the crumpled paper she dropped and read it to herself after the other four had moved into the hall. The cellar? And why were 'No One' and 'Everyone' capitalized? She slid the card into her pocket for further examination later. As she did so her fingers brushed the yarn noose, sending chills racing down her spine. Why on earth had she tied that, of all things? She flicked the thought from her mind and hurried to catch up.

She entered the library just as Velma pulled down on a blue book. The shelf swung inward. Somehow Marianne wasn't surprised. In a house like this one, with murder swimming about, why not go the whole nine yards and put a secret passageway behind the bookcase? They filed into the small room, which instantly felt claustrophobic with five people and the junk that was already there. "How does the door open?" Jennifer prodded.

Bradley snapped his fingers. "I'll wager we use a crowbar."

"I tried that," the older woman responded dryly. "It simply isn't done."

"Let her open it," Daphne reminded them. They grew quiet as Velma hummed under her breath, tapping out on the keypad with such rapidity Marianne almost went cross-eyed from watching. "Long combination."

She glanced up to smile at the redhead. "I know. God Save the Queen takes a while to spell out in its entirety on a lock like this one, especially when you have to use the Polybius square."

"God Save the Queen!" cried Bradley. "I shall give a rousing chorus!"

"Please don't, Bradley; you'll wake the five dead bodies upstairs with your screeching caterwaul."

"How did you know it was God Save the Queen?" Daphne looked curious.

Velma finished tapping and the lock clicked, allowing the door to open smoothly. She nodded to a stack of papers. "Every third word of the beginning sentence of each paragraph. Eventually, once you get through the whole stack, it comes out as God Save the Queen, all the way through. Six verses I thought was a little excessive for a password on a lock, but since it's the national anthem I suppose they couldn't resist all of it."

The tunnel behind the newly opened door led on for some time. Marianne had to keep wiping the sweat off the back of her neck, suddenly very aware of how humid and musty the underground could get when left unused for who knew how long. "Are we even going anywhere or is this a circular tunnel?" she said aloud to their unofficial guide.

"Yes, we're going somewhere. It's a bit of a hike, but I promise it really isn't interminable. You'll get used to it after – " She bit her lip and looked away. "Never mind. Just trust me that it does in fact come out somewhere."

"Doesn't feel it," she mumbled. Intriguing response. After what, she wondered? How many times had she come this way in the span of a day and a half? And for what purposes? She really didn't think the lot of them was that dull.

At last a door proved the end of their journey. Velma pushed it open and stepped back to let them see. "It's the cellar of one of the houses in the fishing village. That's where I was, in the village. If I'd known Shaggy was in the apiary…" She trailed off without finishing. Marianne could tell the smile was forced.

She understood. She wouldn't have let anyone else kill Evan either, but she wouldn't have ever admitted the fact. It was perfectly normal for this denial that she had killed someone special to her, even when Marianne at least knew that was really what had occurred.

Bradley looked content with this alibi and led the way back, proposing they go ahead and have dinner. "After all, with one very hungry mouth gone, we should have just enough for dinner, supper, and breakfast on the morrow. Thanks very much for showing this to us."

Velma flinched a little at the light-hearted mention of Rogers' death, but only nodded with a quick glance at Jennifer. So she really was afraid of Ms. Jennifer Morley, even if she wouldn't willingly admit it. How interesting to know, Marianne thought with a little smile.

The blonde woman thought of the card in her pocket and wondered if it was wise of the younger girl to have done so. Owen was not going to be pleased once he or she remembered the card given to her.


	7. Five Little Indians, Going in for Law

"_**Where's your gavel? Your jury? What's my offense this time? You're not a judge but if you're going to judge me, well, sentence me to another life!" **_**Easily…**

**Chapter Six: Five Little Indians, Going in for Law**

Dinner, as it were, was even more uncomfortable than breakfast. None of the remaining five knew much about cooking, so Sylvester sent Marianne to make sandwiches. Surely she could do that much, he thought.

The old general lit his pipe and settled back into the chair to wait on Marianne and the sandwiches, his eyes flicking over the others. There was an empty chair between each of them, a blatant show of distrust on the part of all. It really was interesting, he told himself, and was only half surprised that he was enjoying this, The tension, the wary flickering glances, and the fear – especially the fear.

_Especially_ the fear.

It reminded him of the war. He loved savoring the fear on the faces of the enemy, and now that he knew which of the remaining women was Owen he was savoring her fear the same way. She was insane; all killers were. All random killers, all serial killers, he mentally corrected himself. Sylvester had done Blarkett in not for a random reason, but for protection, for Angela, to keep her safe. It puzzled him why she had left after Blarkett's death. Did she suspect he had done it? He had told her, once, that he would kill for her to remain his always and forever. Angela never knew just how passionately he clung to that statement, never knew how true it was.

A tap on his shoulder brought him back to the present. "Bradley, stop doing that old soldier thing where you wander off in your head and forget you have a body."

Sylvester accepted the sandwich with a smile. "Apologies, my dear Marianne. You did remember the honey on mine, yes?"

At the mention of honey, which he suddenly remembered was connected with bees and therefore the last death, Velma choked on her water and, amidst a fit of violent coughing, excused herself. Ah, yes; the fear would be enough to make him content for now. He at least would survive, preferably both he and Marianne if the sneaky little devil didn't kill Marianne first.

He had already figured out the order she would kill them now. Jennifer first as there was plainly animosity between the two, then Daphne for trying to keep the peace rather than encourage uncertain tension, then Marianne, then him. He would be last, of course, because it was right. He simply wasn't supposed to die yet. If he had been asked he couldn't have told why he was sure of this order, but he was. And General Bradley Sylvester was never wrong.

The Indian boy facing him was one of five left. His small brown hand held to his forehead looked more like an army salute than the shading of eyes the others had thought, but maybe that was just Sylvester. The ceramic figure's black hair spilling over his bare brown shoulders matched his dark eyes that held a strangely sorrowful expression. Sylvester had to admit, whoever had crafted the centerpiece was truly an artist with an eye for detail, from the thin strokes of fiber-like hair to the muscles of the bare torso to the wrinkles of the deerskin breeches to the fine stitching on the moccasins. A pity "Owen" was wrecking the centerpiece – centerpiece, he mused.

Centerpiece. A homonym for center peace, which she was also wrecking. How ironic.

What _was_ she doing with the little Indian boys, he wondered? Surely there couldn't be many places to hide or dispose of them.

His thoughts were interrupted by the realization that all was silent – he was alone, and his sandwich lay on his plate only half-eaten while a fly buzzed about it, unsure of whether he would kill it if it landed or not. With a flick of his wrist he shooed it away. "Let me eat in p- silence…"

oOo

Normally she hated anything to do with journaling – diaries were for sobbing, pathetic ninnies, not levelheaded, intelligent individuals – but today Velma couldn't stop scribbling in the notebook. It was fascinating how easily her thoughts spilled onto the paper, and even more fascinating trying to keep up with where they were going. It was almost…frightening, in a way, but it all made sense. She'd wanted to look at this from another angle; here were five falling from her own fingers, dropping out of her mind.

_If Sylvester did it – he likes violence. As is proven by the bruises on my wrists. He might be killing in the name of justice because he remembers the wars and believes all mistakes should be punished with death. Trigger-happy old man. Creeper, too…what's with him and Marianne?_

_If Jennifer did it – she's so self-righteous she probably believes all this is the will of God, like she did with that Evangeline girl. I'll bet she likes the sense of moral superiority it gives her too. It wouldn't be surprising if the next death is literally a Bible shoved down someone's throat. Note to self: do not sleep with mouth open._

_If Marianne did it – come to think of it, the first two deaths were poison, and the other three wouldn't be too difficult for her to accomplish. She is fairly fit. Must check apiary for signs of struggle. She's obviously upset about her ex-boyfriend, which raises the matter of most of us having killed for or involving love. (Myself included if you count the significant lack thereof.)_

_If Daphne did it - …hm. Rather tough to come up with a motive for her. She seems to hate tension, whereas Owen would promote it, and she's pretty much the only one left who even pretends to like me at all. Could be an act though; will keep my guard up. Must study her more for possible motivation._

_If I did it – psychodynamic motives, if any. I know I'm innocent, and I haven't been diagnosed with multiple personalities. At least to my knowledge._

She paused a moment. "I'm not crazy," she whispered to herself; then, more fiercely, "I'm not crazy. I'm – I suffer from childhood trauma." Great, that made her sound even more pathetic. With a moan she dropped her head into her hands. "I'm sorry, Trent. I'm not the little sister you had anymore." That was true. Trent's little sister only knew death as a word, and 'blood on one's hands' meant a paper-cut. She wouldn't have dreamed of killing anyone.

Velma shook her head. That little girl didn't exist. She read over the list she had just made, feeling excitement speed up her heart. This was what she'd wanted. Five different ways to look at the puzzle. Five different ways the pieces could fall.

Five little Indians going in for law.

"No!" She stood up, letting the pencil fall to the floor. "I'm not bringing us in for law! I'm doing something about this serial killer instead of passively waiting to die," she hissed at herself to disguise her own fear. In spite of herself she picked up the pencil and added next to her own motive, _Subconsciously preparing for next murder?_

She hoped not.

"Velma?"

She jumped. "What?" Turning, she relaxed. It was Jennifer. Then she remembered the motives she had just come up with and tensed again.

Jennifer's frown twitched. "I understand you must be feeling like a cornered animal right now. It would be easiest if you would simply tell us the truth. I'm sure the Lord would look favorably upon this whole matter if you repe-"

"But it isn't me," she interrupted quietly. "I can't 'repent' of something I haven't done, and I won't say it's me."

The older woman visibly stiffened. Her eyes flashed and she spun on her heel, tossing over her shoulder, "If you refuse to cooperate then I won't try to help you. The more you deny this sin the more your guilt is proven. Think of what your parents would say!"

"That's why they're dead."

Jennifer clicked away without comment. So much for seeming sympathetic Friday night. Velma exhaled and picked up the notebook, tucking the pencil into its spiral. She would just have to prove her innocence herself then.

And if she could do that and at the same time conveniently let Jennifer be killed…

She bit down on her finger forcefully. That kind of thinking scared her. It also reinforced her 'subconscious' theory, which she sincerely did not like. "Come on, Velma," she told herself. "Let's go sweet-talk some honeybees."

The walk to the apiary wasn't nearly as short as she would have liked. It gave her mind more time to panic. You don't want to go there, it screeched in protest. That's where Shaggy died. Why are you going there?

"Buzz off," she muttered under her breath, then winced. Unconsciously making lame bee puns while walking to the site of a murder?

Yep, she was crazy. Forget denial.

A stray bee alerted her of its presence with a whining _bzz_. "Hello there," she crouched down to be eye level with it. "I don't suppose you would be a witness, would you?"

_Bzz, bzzzz bzzz._

"Really. It would be nice to question a witness. Too bad you don't speak English."

_Bzzz._

She sighed and stood again. "And now I'm asking a bee to provide evidence. No, of course I'm not crazy. What leads you to that conclusion?" She glanced down at the bee. "Don't answer that." Turning her attention toward the actual apiary, she studied the ground. It did look like some sort of scuffle had taken place from the marks of heels and feet in the dirt. Scuffling meant he realized he was about to be killed. But who would he follow out to the apiary?

_Bzzz bzzzzzz?_

The bee was not asking a question. It was not asking a question! Bees did not sound inquisitive! "Well, he didn't come out here with me," she told it. "Unless there's something to the subconscious/multiple personality theory. Which there isn't. You're not really talki- buzzing to me, are you?"

_Bzzz…_

It wandered off into one of the manmade hives. "Of course not." She blew out at her bangs. Jinkies. She was actually carrying on a conversation with an insect. "Okay," Velma tried to redirect herself back to the matter at hand, "focus on the facts. One: there was a struggle. That means Shaggy figured out it was Owen before he was killed." She stopped. Killed? Marianne had stated he was dead from allergic reactions to the bee stings. So was it really killed? Or was it an accidental death? "Two," she said slowly as she processed this, "he was actually stung by bees. Three: one of us lured - " This word made her cringe, but she continued aloud anyway. " – him out here without him knowing he was being…right." A yawn made her realize she probably should have spent less time reading on the history of the island looking for any hope of a way out last night and more time sleeping like the others presumably had done. "Four," she sat down and leaned back against a tree so she could still observe the apiary. "He was stung three times, but in what order…?" She closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the trunk. At least Owen wouldn't be able to find her out here.

_Bzzz…_

oOo

Daphne looked up from poking the fire when Jennifer plunked down in the grey armchair, mumbling heatedly to herself. "Bad day?"

"Try bad weekend," the woman laughed harshly. Daphne shut her eyes briefly. If she laughed more often it probably wouldn't sound in need of oiling. "You needn't bother with the fire, we'll all be warm enough soon."

She finished restacking the firewood and went to sit down on the couch, facing Jennifer. "Really? Why do you say that? I thought death was a rather cold thing."

"Because we'll be in the fires of hell, my dear!" Her eyes were fiery too. Daphne inched away. "You've sinned, we've all sinned, and there are no signs of repenting among us!" She was breathing heavily and gulping down air now. "I've sinned! I've sinned, alright? Do you hear me? I've sinned! I admit it. I should have let God be the deciding factor in Evangeline's punishment but instead I took matters into my own hands like a typical, stupid human!"

She nodded slowly to pacify her. "Yes, I understand." She was a Christian herself, but Jennifer's zeal for judgment and punishment bordered on obsession. Definitely over the top. Maybe they were all crazy. Obviously Velma, Jennifer's mad need for judgment, Sylvester's love for brutal war stories, Marianne's odd way of drifting off every now and then to what Daphne suspected was Evan-land.

And herself. Incapable of feeling.

From the moment they had arrived she had felt as if she were experiencing everything in third person, as if she weren't really there but only watching someone else who looked and acted like her. The shock of this was why when Freddy had suddenly keeled over she had burst into tears. His death was only an excuse to let out the confusion and panic this new lack of feeling brought. She did manage to bring herself under control again quickly though. That at least was an advantage of depersonalization.

She realized Jennifer had been ranting. "…and I just can't take it anymore!"

This was slightly awkward. How to comfort a woman when you haven't heard anything she's said? "You only have to make it through to tomorrow," she settled on. "The ferry master will be here. Owen only told us we would be here for the weekend."

Horror flashed across Jennifer's face and she suddenly leaned forward. "Don't you see? We were told that because we'll be dead before the ferry master arrives! When that man comes and finds no one on the jetty, he'll come up to the house and find ten dead bodies instead. Owen is going to kill us all by tomorrow, so there's no way out!" She looked about twice her age when she buried her face in her gnarled hands and rocked back and forth, moaning, "No way out, no way out, no way out!"

This was not the reaction she'd been hoping for. "We can still avoid the deaths," Daphne tried.

It didn't work. "No, we can't!" Jennifer snapped. She ticked off on her fingers as she talked. "One got in Chancery, a red herring swallowed one, a big bear hugged one, one got frizzled up and one hung himself. The only one possibly able to be prevented is the hanging, and that will be Owen! There is no way to prevent any more deaths unless we discover who Owen is."

And we already know, Daphne added silently.

The older woman leaned back in the rocking chair and closed her eyes. "I'm going to take a nap," she said tiredly. "This kind of stress can't be good for my health."

Funny. She would have thought Jennifer to be of a sturdy constitution. "I'll go take a walk," she said instead. Rising to her feet, she smiled when a soft snore erupted in Jennifer's throat. If everyone could get to sleep that quickly, she thought, I wouldn't know the meaning of insomnia.

Her feet took over the walk. Daphne let them. What did she care where she went? It wasn't as if there was any real place to go on this blasted island. It would give her time to think. If Jennifer was right and they really couldn't prevent any more deaths, then how would she be able to outwit Owen and survive? She supposed her parents could access her bank account if they needed money, and the royalties from her work with Armani would help them get by well enough. A shame she wouldn't be able to submit her latest designs though. They were inspired by this weekend, and she hated them all. There was a strapless crimson dress that wound around the body, giving it a seamless appearance. That was inspired by the thought of liquid poison, and of blood. There was also a pair of pants with a trail of bees wrapping around the right leg. The one she hated most though was a high-necked shirt with short sleeves. The ribbed material accented the choked look of the collar. That one's death hadn't actually happened yet.

The hanging.

She slowed when she saw where her determined feet were taking her. The apiary? Why here? Maybe she was just walking by it. Whatever her feet would have decided, however, was quickly changed when she spotted a figure curled on the ground. Panic welled up in her. Not another dead body in the apiary! She hurried over to the still form. Velma? But – she – what? As far as she could tell the other girl didn't have any markings on her. So poison? Marianne!

"Quick, Daphne, think of something," she whispered out loud, blue eyes darting back and forth. Maybe she wasn't dead yet. Maybe she could still be saved. She had to check first.

She had just lifted her wrist to check for a pulse when Velma sat up suddenly and smacked her across the face. "Oh! Daphne! I'm sorry!" Surprise was written on her face.

Daphne fell back onto the dirt in a sitting position, silently ruing the dirtying of her dress. "It's okay," she forced herself to say with a smile. "You looked…"

"Oh," she said. "…oh. I think I fell asleep. I'm so sorry. Are you okay?"

This didn't seem like killer behavior, she pondered. "I will be if I can get the grass stains out of this dress."

Velma laughed. "Come on, there has to be a washer back at the house, and judging by the number of suitcases you brought there has to be at least one more dress you can wear, right?"

"Right," Daphne said. She was getting suspicious now. Why so friendly out of the blue? And why did she have a notebook all the way out here? If she asked she'd be sure to get a lie though. No; she wouldn't ask what she was doing taking a nap out here in the first place.

It wasn't worth it since they'd all be dead by tomorrow anyway.

The two of them were almost back to the house when they heard the scream. "That sounded like Marianne," Daphne cried.

Velma's eyes were wide. "Do you think - ?" Before she finished she took off toward the house. Daphne sprinted after her. She grabbed at the glass door to keep it from shutting, briefly wondering how she could go so fast, and stumbled through into the library, where the others were already gathered.

Sylvester lay sprawled on the floor, eyes bulging, face purplish, mouth gagged with crumpled sheets of paper.

"Uncle Bradley!" Marianne screamed again. "Uncle Bradleeeey!" The name ended in a hysterical shriek. The blonde, normally so calm and collected, now spun to face the other three with wild eyes. "Which of you killed him? Which one of you did this?"

No one moved.

"_Who killed him?_" Marianne whipped back around to look at the body. "Uncle, Uncle," she whimpered, dropping to her knees beside the dead man. She bowed her head and shook silently for a few moments. When she lifted her head again she was composed, no outward signs of her breakdown. "He's already dead," she said. She examined his throat carefully and pronounced the cause to be strangulation with his own shirt collar. Her hand darted to his mouth to retrieve the crumpled paper. She smoothed it out, carefully dabbing the saliva off on Sylvester's shirt. "I believe these are yours," she said coldly, handing the paper to Jennifer.

"What – no!" She rushed out of the room. The sudden quiet made Daphne remember what Marianne had said. She must have said 'I'm his niece;' that accounted for the n or m sound. Jennifer returned with her King James Bible, white as a sheet. "These pages were torn from my Bible," she said through gritted teeth. "Whoever has torn this will be sorry."

Velma swallowed nervously. "I…I'm going to go to my room for a little while." She darted out before any of the others could speak.

Marianne sat back on her heels as a ghost of a smile graced her face. "And then there were four. Who's next? Who knows? …who cares?"


	8. Four Little Indians, Going Out to Sea

"_**I have no fear of the drowning, it's the breathing that's taking all this work."**_** As it should, my dear.**

**Chapter Seven: Four Little Indians, Going Out to Sea**

Velma stared at her own written words. This was insane. A Bible shoved down someone's throat, she'd written, and look at Sylvester's death. Pages torn from Genesis stuffed into his mouth. It couldn't have been her though; she'd been asleep at the apiary. Unless…

She realized she was biting her lip hard enough to draw blood. Ow. It didn't take long to cross out Sylvester from the list and underline the comment she'd made about the Bible. So. Owen really was a woman. Jennifer, Marianne, Daphne – or herself.

She desperately hoped it wasn't last one.

Brow furrowed, she scrutinized the paper. She was pretty sure that convincing Daphne she was really one of the 'good guys' would allow her to get close enough to observe a possible motive. As for the others? Discovering Sylvester was Marianne's uncle was a strike against that possibility. Surely she wouldn't kill her own uncle.

A little voice in her head sing-songed, _But surely a fifteen-year-old wouldn't kill her own parents_. "Just shut it," she mumbled at the little voice. "That was four years ago. What's done is done, alright?" The pencil lead broke. Talking to annoying voices in one's head had to be on the same level, if not worse than, talking to small honey-making insects. The logical conclusion that followed was to stop talking to it. At least out loud.

After sharpening her pencil, Velma set to the task of planning out what exactly she could do next. If I were a serial killer, she thought, how would I go about doing this?

She smiled. "That, my dear Watson, is an excellent question. Let's try speculating, shall we?" And if the speculations proved correct she would know it really was her. She flipped to a clean sheet of paper and began to write.

oOo

Jennifer's fingers flicked over her knitting, but her mind was elsewhere. This clearly followed the classic locked-room scenario. Or rather, in this case, isolated island off the southwestern shore of Devonshire scenario. A pity they would all be dead before the police could do anything about it.

"Ouch!" She jerked her left thumb away and sucked at it. What was wrong with her? She'd never pricked a finger with her knitting needles before, and now she stabbed herself in the thumb? "Clumsy, clumsy," she muttered to herself. "It's either your age or the stress that's getting to you. Foolish."

Daphne appeared in the doorway of the sitting room with an odd look on her face. "Jennifer, you haven't been in the dining room, have you?"

"No, why should I have been?"

"As far as I can tell none of us have," the redhead said slowly, "but there are only four Indian boys left in the ceramic piece."

She shrugged, shaking the hand with the injured thumb to rid it of the stung feeling. "Wonderful news, Daphne. I for one had no idea they were going missing."

"But the other two say they haven't been in the dining room either," Daphne started to protest, but Jennifer broke her off.

"Of course they say that. Are you accustomed to a little thing called denial? It's commonly known among the church as a sin by the name of lying. Perhaps you are more familiar with it by that name. No? It's an untruth, dear, a misgiving or specific withholding of information. Lots of people do it." She resumed knitting. "Even I did, at the inquest…"

Daphne rolled her eyes. "Yada yada yada. Yeah, I know. I know what lying is. I just thought maybe –"

" – the figures were getting up and walking off on their own?" Jennifer feigned contemplation. "Oh, yes, that's a marvelous notion! Why don't we test it? That's right, because it isn't possible," she snapped.

She huffed. "I was going to say that you might have seen which of them went in there, but never mind since it's such a ridiculous idea." Having said this, she turned on her heel and left again.

Jennifer scowled down at the knitting. It struck her just then as really quite pointless. She'd never have the chance to give it to her niece, and sweaters weren't particularly helpful when one was dead. Not much was, now that she thought about it. Not even that little jou-

Of course! The journal, she realized, that was how she could ensure that the police would know the truth once they arrived. She dropped her knitting into a tangled mess in the basket. It didn't take her long to bolt herself into her room and begin her search for that book. Now, where did she put it again? The police would want an accurate account, of course, and who better to give one than a victim herself? Yes, yes, this would work nicely. Case solved thanks to helpful journal entries made by goodhearted woman.

As she scribbled down her side of the story, she spoke aloud to herself, reciting verses pertaining to speaking the truth as encouragement. "And because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not."

She stopped. John 8:45 wasn't very encouraging. She wanted them to believe her. Continuing, she racked her brain for other verses.

"Am I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the truth?"

Galatians 4:16 was out too.

"Ahh – Nevertheless I tell you the truth; it is expedient for you that I go away: for if I do not go away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send Him unto you."

Yes, John 16:7 was encouraging. She could only think of that because it had the word 'truth' in it, but the thought of the Holy Spirit coming to her was pleasant.

Another one, quick, she commanded herself. "But I tell you of a truth, there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the kingdom of God." A smile stretched her thin mouth. Luke 9:27. Wonderful. Now if only Jennifer Morley could be one of those who would not taste death.

She went on in this way, reciting verses to herself. Some made little or no sense in relation to what she was doing and she merely recited them because they had the word truth in them. When she recited one of those she felt as if she were grasping at straws. Every now and again, though, she would find one that fit brilliantly and made her smile.

It was close to suppertime when she finished her testimony to what was occurring on Manse Island, and in doing so, the poor little journal whose pages she had thoroughly covered. Had it been an animate object with feelings it would have been exhausted from the working it had just received. Since it was not an animate object however, it simply lay there while Jennifer stretched and looked at the clock on the wall. "Goodness," she couldn't keep from saying aloud, "I've been rather busy, haven't I?"

oOo

Marianne had been busy. Since Bradley had died she had been examining the body, outrage boiling under her skin that this man had died this way. He deserved a soldier's death at the very least. But this? This was highly unacceptable.

There were no finger and thumb bruises on the body, unfortunately meaning she wouldn't be able to tell which of the remaining women it was. The Bible pages had most likely been forced into his mouth after he died, raising the question of why Bradley didn't cry out when he was being strangled, using his own shirt collar, no less. Further examination provided the answer. Owen had crept up from behind him, seized the collar of his shirt and twisted it, effectively cutting off both circulation of blood to the brain and blocking the trachea's air supply. A remarkably smart way of asphyxiating him, if also remarkably simple.

Too simple. So simple that it provided no help at all. The question still remained – who was Owen? Any of them could have done it. Bradley, for all his gusto, wasn't good at resisting physical force. His war days were long since past. He wouldn't have been a difficult target to get rid of at all, especially caught unawares from behind like this.

Marianne exhaled, sweeping her blonde hair behind one ear. "Bradley, who killed you?" she murmured as she tucked the sheets of his bed around his overweight body. No, she mentally corrected, his _dead_-weight body. Taking a step back to admire her handiwork, she thought she heard a noise behind her. Upon spinning around, however, it proved to be a paper she had knocked from the nightstand. She picked it up and smoothed it out. Only his letter of invitation. Oh, Bradley. He always did keep the strangest things with him.

She closed her eyes to keep from remembering. He was gone and that was that. No regrets, no remembering, no feeling, no tag-backs. Now all there was to do was wait on Owen to strike again. So far the only modus operandi they had for her was the rhyme. That told nothing of who the next victim might be, or how it might be committed. The next obviously had something to do with the water, but what?

The nurse smiled grimly. That could only be discovered with the body of whichever poor soul was next on the hit list. A red herring swallowed one, was it? She wondered where the fish in question would leave the bones. Perhaps she had better scout out the shoreline before Owen had enough time to recuperate from the last death.

Poor, stupid Bradley.

Gently closing the door to her uncle's room, she stole down the stairs and crept past the empty sitting room. She cringed when the front door squeaked rather loudly. No. No one was there. Good.

The weather at least was nice, she noticed. Not storming anymore. Still foggy, but at least it wasn't raining and the chill in the air was hardly worth complaining about as she walked. Now, Marianne thought, first things first. Where does the tide bring in the most debris? This answer would require getting down on the beach. With little difficulty she slid down the steep embankment to the beach. There was a section where the water had carved out its own little nook in the sand, where it gathered piles of driftwood, torn fishing nets, pieces of wrecked ships, and other trash that the sea had bestowed on Manse Island. That's where the body will end up, she surmised. Then the murder will take place somewhere around here. Her eyes followed the curvature of the rock. There. On top of Schooner Rock. Since herrings weren't red and generally didn't feed on humans, Marianne supposed that some kind of blood would be used to lure out a shark or two, most likely from the body itself. Then once the sharks had had their fill the body would wash up on the shore, in the sand.

Nobody was around. And there weren't any sharks about. She could take a look. The path to Schooner Rock wasn't well-trodden like some of the others, such as the one down to the jetty, but it was traveled well enough for her climb to be relatively easy. She caught her breath as she stared out at the ocean. It looked so wide, yet the rest of England had to be right there behind the furthermost fog. Funny how shortsighted fog made one.

This was her last thought before something hard crashed down onto her skull.

oOo

Daphne couldn't stop pacing. Something didn't feel right. Something was wrong. But what? Everyone was inside – that was it. She was inside with the killer. That's what was wrong, she seized onto the idea. She just needed some fresh air. The redhead slipped her feet into a stylish pair of purple and grey walking shoes, grabbed a jacket, and hurried out of the games room and the house entirely. The fresh air already made her feel less uneasy. She felt like skipping.

Or she would, if she could feel. That thought made her suck in a breath and continue on her way, head held high. She wouldn't be able to feel after she was dead anyway, so this was good practice, right? At the same time she knew it wasn't. A human being should be able to feel, to experience emotion, even if she has been condemned to death.

Think of something else, Daphne; something happy, quick. Ah – purple. Purple always made her happy. Except when it was the color of Sylvester's face. No, purple wasn't something she wanted to think about right now. She wasn't even sure she wanted to think, now that she considered it. No, no thinking. Just walk.

Right.

Just walk.

She stopped a moment to plan her route. I could go around to the old fishing village and see if the door to the library tunnel is accessible from that end, she thought, then make my way back around and stop by the jetty to see if the ferry master decided to come early. Not that that hope would lead anywhere. She turned on her heel, away from Schooner Rock, and kept going. Just walk, Daphne.

oOo

Marianne roused to half-consciousness when she hit the water. Her hands were knotted behind her back, and her ankles were tied to a stone. I'm going to drown, she thought in panic. She twisted and squirmed in the water, struggling not to give in to the urge to breathe, but she couldn't free herself. The blonde craned her neck upward in a vain attempt at reaching the surface, or at least seeing who Owen was. There was no figure visible through the churning water. She couldn't even see the rock face above her.

Her eyes widened when she could fight it no longer. Mouth opened in defeat, she sucked in the liquid that would destroy her lungs. Memories flooded her mind the same way the seawater flooded her airway to asphyxiate her. She could feel the laryngospasm coming on; unconsciousness couldn't be too far off then.

"Marianne," a voice sang from above her. With her last motion, she turned her head up to see laughing green eyes. "Looks like I'm not the only one to fall from a cliff, sweetheart…"

oOo

Daphne exhaled. The door to the tunnel locked from the inside, so the apparently one could only get to the library from inside the house. That didn't reveal anything new. To her knowledge everyone had been in the house when Sylvester was killed except herself. Velma could have feigned being asleep if she had returned just before Daphne reached the apiary, but she was starting to doubt Jennifer's innocence. The woman was getting incredibly easy to irritate. Because she was getting closer to running out of victims?

As Marianne had said, who knew? Who cared? The only way they would know who Owen was would be when they were dead, since she obviously wasn't going to purposefully slip up and didn't seem to be doing much in the accidental department either. If only one of the other three left had reacted in a way that wasn't just innocent surprise when she'd told about Freddy's body in the screening room! She'd only moved it there for that purpose. But no, not one person had acted like they'd lost control of the situation.

The redhead was nearing the end of her walk now. She could see Schooner Rock up ahead again; now she was close enough to see down to the beach, where there was a collection of driftwood, ship pieces, a dead body – a what?

Heart pounding, Daphne inched down the path to the beach. A sickened moan escaped her when she saw the tell-tale blonde hair partially obscuring a discolored face. The gravelly dirt crunched under her feet as she backed away, slowly at first, then turned and ran back to the house.

The door slammed against the wall. "Marianne's dead!" she cried, trembling.

Jennifer appeared in the hall with an unreadable expression; Velma's footsteps echoing hurriedly on the stairs brought her there shortly after. "What?"

"Marianne is dead," Daphne gulped down air. "Marianne. Is dead. Drowned. Beach down by Schooner Rock. Hurry!"

The three of them scurried down to where Marianne's body lay. Daphne hung back, not wanting to see any more than she already had, but the other two were braver than she was. Jennifer inspected the dead woman's pockets while Velma brushed her wet hair away. "She probably did drown," she said after a moment, "although if this was as recent as we have to assume there's no way to get a definite yes on that, since she's – mmmerr, was – the medical expert."

"The stones attached to her ankles aren't heavy enough to actually have kept her from washing up, just heavy enough to hold her under until she had," Jennifer observed.

Daphne could see that Velma was taking this into account. "So she was probably tossed out a good ways in order to make sure she would be dead before she ended up onshore?" She sounded like a student checking with a teacher to make sure she had the right answer.

Daphne felt sick that they could take this news so easily. Then again, she wasn't particularly sorry herself, so who was she to judge? "Well, don't ask me," Jennifer said, eyebrows raising innocently. "I wouldn't know the first thing about drowning someone."

Velma clamped her mouth shut and went back to studying Marianne's corpse.

Clearing her throat, the redhead suggested meekly, "Shouldn't we get her back inside, to her room?"

They both looked up at her. "Yes, that's a splendid idea," Jennifer said dryly. "Velma, you lift that end and I'll carry this."

Daphne stepped back to let them go first. As they passed, she thought she heard Velma mumbling something that sounded like, "I only zoned out a moment, I couldn't have done anything…" What was that all about, she wondered?

It couldn't be too important, she told herself. Nothing could be too important anymore. That being said, she'd have to try to remember to figure out what it could mean. For now?

They had a body to take care of.

After the second time Velma ran into the door, Daphne offered to take over for her. "Thanks," she said with half a smile. "I'm not the best at walking backwards."

Especially carrying a body, Daphne could almost hear the unsaid addition. She tried not to think about that while she hefted Marianne's stiffening form up the stairs, Jennifer carrying the nurse's legs. Thankfully her bed was still unmade, so they awkwardly shoved her under the sheets and pulled them over her head. Daphne shuddered and averted her gaze from the face before Jennifer covered it.

Marianne's eyes were still open.

Through all that had happened, she hadn't actually seen any of the dead's eyes. Now that she had she knew it was a sight she wanted to never see again. Glassy, vacant eyes staring as if lost in thought – no, she begged herself, stop thinking about it!

After a few moments, Velma said quietly, "At least there aren't any bears on the island that we know of."

"_**I was a heavy heart to carry; my beloved was weighed down, my arms around his neck, my fingers laced a crown. I was a heavy heart to carry; my feet dragged across the ground, and he took me to the river, where he slowly let me drown."**_** What comes around…**


	9. Three Little Indians, Walking in the Zoo

"_**Put a chain around my neck and lead me anywhere; oh let me be your teddy bear."**_** If you insist.**

**Chapter Eight: Three Little Indians, Walking in the Zoo**

By now Jennifer was fairly certain that she was getting paranoid. At every little moan of the wind she jumped as if the whole of the British Navy was after her. Nothing she told herself or recited aloud could make her feel any less uneasy. She was back to knitting in the sitting room again. Usually the steady tap-click of the needles was calming.

Usually. This was, she reminded herself, most certainly not usual circumstances. Usually she didn't have a psycho killer living down the hall from her. Usually she wasn't trapped on an island with no way to get help. Usually she wouldn't be worried that someone would try stealing her witness testimony. Usually she could walk into the kitchen and find some _cooked_ food.

Virtually nothing about Manse Island was usual for Jennifer Morley.

She found herself thinking back on that Carruthers girl. If she had learned anything from that incident it was that murder was easy. Easy to perform, easy to cover up, easy to keep concealed. Perhaps that was the problem. If murder was easy, then all of these killings were simple for Owen! Then and there she vowed to herself that her murder, when it came time, would not be easy.

Oh, no, she smiled to herself. Jennifer's killing would be most difficult once Owen say how she could fight back.

oOo

This was such a crooked house, Velma thought as she crossed off Marianne's motive from her list. Murder and deception and such all made it so very crooked. She supposed it wasn't really the house's fault. The house couldn't decide what the people who owned it did. Own. She furrowed her brow and sounded it aloud. "Own. Ow-en. Own. The unknown Owen owns – what?" Nothing seemed to fit the tongue twister, so she let it be. The unknown Owen owns.

Owns the house.

The victims.

Death itself, if you will.

The unknown Owen owns everything, she acknowledged grimly. Owns everything, sees everything, knows everything, it would seem. She shook her head to rid it of the thought. _Silly girl, get back to work._

_Yes, Mother._

_I'm not your mother._

_I know. But you're her voice._

_In your head?_

"Yes." The pencil lead broke again. She scowled down at it. "What, do you just feel the need to break every time I really start having a good conversation with myself? That's all I'm doing. Plenty of normal people talk to themselves I'm told." Under her breath she muttered, "Unfortunately the definition of normal in today's society seems to border on slightly mad, so I technically qualify as just as insane as the next person."

She couldn't come up with a motive for Daphne. She just seemed so _nice_. Nice people didn't generate motives the same way that un-nice people did. Then again, nice people also didn't shove their boyfriends out the door of a car onto a highway. Ah well. She'd just have to figure something out.

She'd have to figure something out, before Owen struck again, she corrected. That was the hard part. If it really was Daphne, and she didn't come up with a solid motive before either she or Jennifer ended up on the receiving end of a killer bear hug, there was a good possibility she would wind up both dead and clueless as to why. And isn't that a pretty situation, she thought wryly. Who wouldn't want to be dead with no idea why they'd been killed?

"Pfft. Get back on track, Velma," she ordered herself. "A big bear hugged one. What kind of bear?" If Sylvester was still around she would be tempted to consider him as the 'big bear' due to his, er, largeness, but since he wasn't…? She definitely didn't have a teddy bear and seriously doubted either Jennifer or Daphne had one. The mental image of straight-backed, frowning Miss Morley hugging a teddy bear made her snicker. That would be a sight worth photographing.

Her conclusion so far was that there were no actual bears on the island, it couldn't be Sylvester because he was dead, and there were no teddy bears (although how a teddy bear would kill someone she wasn't even going to try imagining), which left her mind blank. How on earth would a bear fit into the picture? Maybe there was a bear-shaped knick-knack on the mantel or in one of the rooms. She hadn't seen any of those children's zoo play-sets, but it would be just odd enough that Owen would probably think of it.

She started in the sitting room. Nothing of interest on the mantel, which was both a relief and a disappointment. She did notice the excessive amount of – "ah-ah-wahh-CHOO!" – dust. Dorothy must not have been able to dust up there. That or dust just gathered very easily when there were dead people in the house.

Don't think about that. Dead people aren't related to looking for bears in the house. At least, not directly. Something under the pool table caught her eye. "Another business card?" she mused, crawling underneath to pick it up.

'Please don't touch this card. I've left it here for the Curly Sewing Iron crew to investigate. Perhaps they'll figure out who I am. Perhaps not. You haven't.'

"Curly Sewing Iron crew?" That was new. "Too late for not touching," she sing-songed to herself. "Well. Ms. Owen can just make a new one." She wished she'd kept the last one about the cellar. Maybe something on there in the wording would be useful in figuring out this little mystery. Mystery, she smiled. She'd always liked reading mysteries. Who would have thought Velma Dinkley would be living one?

Curly Sewing Iron crew…the words were meaningless. What – no, _why_ were they chosen? What they meant could be figured out after she knew why. Why was always important. If one knew the why, she believed, one could master anything. Curly Sewing Iron crew. It was something to think about. Velma tucked the card into the pocket of her skirt. No harm in taking it if she'd end up dead anyway. Owen could just take it from her pocket after killing her and put it back.

Suddenly the phrase 'over my dead body' had an entirely new meaning.

Crawling back out from under the pool table, she hurriedly made sure the other two weren't around before slipping into the library. She was pretty sure there were absolutely no bears in the library, but it gave her an excuse to be in there with the smell of old books.

Besides, she needed something new to read tonight after she finished _What the Circle Encircled_. Maybe she could find something else by Sarah Kell. She could use all the mystery help she could get.

oOo

Daphne was getting frustrated. Pacing her room didn't help her think. Why didn't the motion help? Motion always helped. Except now. Maybe it was that Marianne's room was on one side of hers and Velma's was on the other. Jennifer being two doors across the hall didn't help either.

They were all so close. And yet, no three people could have been further apart. Jennifer, the stern and strait-laced older woman with a penchant for hypocrisy. Velma, the seemingly quiet, bookish, …mentally unbalanced girl. Daphne, the subtly fashionable girl with absolutely no emotion thanks to the killer on the loose. Yes, they were definitely all supposed to be there, but if they weren't? No three social classes could be further. She guessed that there might have been a way she could have been friends with Velma, in another life, but frankly that was a very big 'might' with a substantial 'maybe' added in there for good measure.

Finally fed up with the futility of pacing, the redhead flung herself across the bed. "I am going to die," she whispered out loud. "Someone is going to kill me. Daphne Blake will be no more."

It didn't sound so bad if she thought about it in a distanced, third-person sort of way.

"I am going to die. I will die. I am going to die today or tomorrow morning, possibly even tonight. I am going to die."

Now, in a more direct and first-person approach to the thought, it was a little bit less acceptable-sounding.

"Daphne, you are going to die. You are going to die soon."

Taking a second-person, in the face look at this was even less acceptable to the point of being very, very bad. She decided she'd rather think about it in the third-person sort of way.

Or better yet, not have to die at all.

There was a light tap at the door. "Who is it?" She sat up, hearing the tense panic in her own voice.

A pause. "Just me. Can I come in?"

Velma. What did she want? Daphne scurried to the door and peeked out. She didn't look like she was carrying anything dangerous, and there wasn't anything to do with bears around. "Alright. Come in." The door squeaked on its way to the wall.

"Thank you." Politeness was useless in the face of death, she wanted to tell the other girl, but kept her mouth closed. Velma's brown eyes darted around the room. Behind her glasses the motion made her look slightly scared. Although, she allowed herself, there was good reason to be scared if she wasn't Owen and good reason to act scared if she was. Her eyes seemed to stop on something behind Daphne, but then she forced a smile and returned her gaze to the redhead. "I was just wondering if…you were hungry…?"

Come to think of it, she was a little bit. "Not particularly," she answered instead. A flicker of disappointment crossed Velma's face, but she quickly regained her composure.

"A-alright. I just thought that since, you know, it's almost suppertime and…oh, never mind." She backed out of the room and was gone before Daphne could blink.

What, she wondered, was that all about?

oOo

Velma could have thrown the chair she was standing on out the window. Daphne had a bear-shaped clock in her room. But _what motive_, she wanted to scream.

Standing on this chair, she could just reach the ceiling. She wanted to make sure there wasn't a hook of any sort on the ceilings. Her room was fine, and she hadn't spotted anything on Daphne's ceiling, but she couldn't be sure it wasn't just small. Glasses fixed most of her eyesight problems, but they couldn't guarantee she'd see everything. That included hooks or other protrusions for tying a noose on the ceilings.

She blew at her bangs as she jumped off the chair. Nothing on Jennifer's ceiling either. She didn't want to admit it, but she was dreading having to check the deceased's rooms. Maybe she could just let it slide. No, she mentally sighed, if she wanted to stay alive she'd have to check. She dragged the chair from Jennifer's room into Marianne's room, hoping Daphne wouldn't hear the 'shkkkk' of the chair's feet on the carpeted hall. The door didn't open in any case, she reassured herself.

Marianne's room. It felt strange to be in here so soon after the death had taken place. Carefully she steadied the chair, then climbed onto it and began searching the ceiling. _Please, please, let there be something somewhere that helps point me in the right direction._

_Who are you talking to?_

_I was talking to God…is that a problem, Mother?_

_I told you, I'm not your mother. Fine, I'm her voice. But I'm not your mother._

_I don't care. You sound like her and you're in my head. I can call you whatever I like._

_You'd better stop and focus on that ceiling again if you want to figure anything out!_

She snapped her eyes open. How long had she been just standing there? There wasn't anything here. She took a step backwards off the chair to reposition it in a new part of the room. Hopefully neither of the others were dead or she might have to add 'continually zones out when deaths take place' to her own motive list. She really didn't like having a motive list for herself, but it was another way of looking at the jigsaw. Not much to do but take it objectively rather than subjectively. If she could.

oOo

Now that she thought about it, she really could use something to eat. She was getting hungry and that offer of suppertime sounded pretty good to Daphne right then. "Oh, what the heck," she griped. "It's just food. It's not as though she poisoned it or anything because that has absolutely nothing to do with bears of any sort that I can think of." Keeping this in mind, she yanked the door open and started down the stairs. A thud like that of someone jumping onto the ground from a bed or other piece of furniture came from behind her, but she paid it no mind. Probably one of the bodies falling out of their beds with the post-death muscle spasms. "Jeepers, if I can think that calmly…" She shook her head and continued on her way down the stairs.

Cautiously peeking around the door to the dining room, she was relieved to see that no one was there. Good. That meant she could eat in peace. She started in, humming a merry tune, when the music died on her lips.

There were only two little Indians left.

Slowly she turned to look behind her. No dead bodies on the floor. Slowly she turned again and peeped over the table. No dead bodies there. A nervous laugh sprang out. Owen had just made a fluke, that's all. She did take a quick look under the table to make sure Jennifer or Velma wasn't hiding there to kill her. "Okay, okay, it's okay, breathe, Daphne, breathe. It's okay."

Upon opening the door to the kitchen though she saw that it was very much not okay.

Food was strewn everywhere, all over the floor and swept from the cabinets. A few doors of the cabinets were hanging slightly crooked on their hinges, as if a person had grabbed onto them and let their feet dangle off the ground. One chair from the servants' table was knocked to the ground, and there, on the floor in the middle of all the mess, was the little Indian who had been hugged by a bear.

Jennifer Morley.

Now, in situations like this, when one has just found a second dead body after finding another so recently, the rational thing to do is to not panic or scream or any of those things, but to decide whether or not it is safe to stay in the situation. As leaving wasn't an option, Daphne went with the less rational choice and screamed.

She kept screaming until the door to the kitchen banged open and Velma said, "Would you _stop_ tha-! Oh…"

Jennifer's face was contorted into what Daphne would have called a grin on anyone else, but on Jennifer it just looked horribly out of place and altogether wrong so she settled on a grimace. Her hands were limply over her shoulders, as if she had been clawing at her attacker, but her arms were crossed in an additional jab at the rhyme – she was hugging herself. Around her neck was rigidly tied a handkerchief-thin scarf embroidered with little dancing bears. This section of the scarf was carefully folded over the front of her neck as to be plainly visible.

She was, indubitably, dead.

"Um." Daphne was trying to breathe normally now and had almost forgotten the other live person in the room. Now she looked at Velma while gulping air like someone who has just returned to the surface after scuba diving on a half-empty oxygen tank. "Should we take her up to her room and then look over the body or vice versa?"

"I don't care! Just get away!" The realization had crashed down on her as Velma talked. There were only two of them left. There was no doubt who Owen was anymore. She backed out of the kitchen, feeling panic rising in her chest and making her start to hyperventilate again. "Get away from me!" she shrieked, "get away!"

Surprise was written all over the brunette's face. "What?"

"Get away!" She was screaming now as she turned and ran from the dining room, out of the hallway, out of the house. She didn't know where she was going, so long as she was away from the killer.

Death did not agree with her.

oOo

Velma stared after Daphne for a moment, then thoughtfully processed the implications of Jennifer's death. Being a more rational person, as she considered herself, she wasn't one for screaming when dead bodies were found.

Possibly laughing maniacally if she'd forgotten (conveniently or otherwise) to take that confounded medicine, but not screaming.

Jennifer's odd facial expression could have been funny if she wasn't so…dead. An unsentimental thought, even a little bit cold she supposed, but what could be expected from someone who had experienced eight deaths within the last two days? She for one wasn't planning to weep for this woman. She had her doubts that even her family members would be weeping. Jennifer Morley seemed like the kind of women whom nobody could get close enough to to learn to love, if it was actually possible to even like Jennifer.

She'd better check the Jennifer's pockets for anything 'Owen' – who was looking more and more like an alternate personality of herself since she couldn't come up with a motive for Daphne at all – might have left, such as another of those business cards. "Well," she reasoned, "can't be too hard to do. She was the one to check Marianne's. Although she did end up dead afterwards."

That was an unsettling thought. But it did have to be done. Then she could wait on Daphne's return. A thought struck her. Daphne had left the house. She could finally check the other girl's room!

_For what?_

_A noose-hook. Or other incriminating evidence, I'm not too picky either way._

_You really ought to stop zoning out like this, you know. It's a dreadfully irritating habit and someone always seems to end up dead afterwards._

Maybe she had better write that down before she discounted it for subjective reasons.


	10. Two Little Indians, Sitting in the Sun

"_**We've waited far too long, incinerate this! To all the anarchy inside we can't escape, set it off, let it all burn down! To all the hell inside that's been controlling me, set it off, set it off, watch it all burn down!"**_** Alrighty then, let's burn it.**

**Chapter Nine: Two Little Indians, Sitting in the Sun**

It took Velma almost twenty minutes to drag Jennifer up the stairs and into her room. The woman's body was a lot heavier than she looked, and having to take care not to mess up any possible evidence made it even more cumbersome. By the time the feat was accomplished the sun was beginning to set and its fingers of light painted pink, orange, and yellow streaks across the sky. Letting go of the corpse, she swiped a hand across her forehead to rid it of the dampness before dropping to her knees beside the body. Jennifer's eyes were half-open and her neck was bent at an awkward angle. Rigor mortis hadn't set in yet. She figured she had a little more than two hours at the least. That meant she'd have to work fast.

Quickly she dug her fingers into the pockets of Jennifer's dress. She felt something, and, pulling it out, wondered where the older woman would have gotten such a thing. A miniature noose, knotted from the grey yarn she'd seen her using for knitting.

"I didn't know you could knot as well as knit," she thought aloud. As she turned it over in her hands something crusty brushed off of it. "Salt…" So Marianne was the one who had knotted it, and not Jennifer. Jennifer had not knotted it. That sounded funny. A smile played over her lips. "So you can_not_. You cannot knot." Glancing down at the body so obviously dead, she amended, "Could not, cannot; cannot sounds better. I've come to an agreement with corny puns."

The question still remained. Why did Marianne knot a noose and keep it in her pocket? Maybe Jennifer's possessions would yield something else. Velma felt slightly awkward digging through the pockets of a cadaver, but that feeling was soon erased once she saw what else was in Jennifer's pocket.

She withdrew a crumpled, illegible piece of paper about the size of a business card, presumably ruined by seawater. Written on the back, in her own handwriting, was the warning, 'I thought I said tell No One about the passageway in the library. Instead you told Everyone. Fool. Enjoy dying – it will not be merciful.'

What was the significance of the capitalized pronouns? First the Curly Sewing Iron crew, now this again. She'd had to tell to prove her innocence, she justified to herself. If she even was innocent. "Everyone and no one," she mused. "Everyone starts with 'e'. Marianne, Sylvester, Jennifer, Daphne." Her eyebrows shot up. All four had the letter 'e' in their names. Even Sylvester's first name had an 'e'. But the No One? "No one…no one. Why no one, Owen?"

Click. There went the puzzle piece. No one and Owen could easily be switched. So tell Owen? That didn't make sense. The puzzle piece fit, but was it a false piece? She didn't know. Maybe. But for now that was all she had to go on.

And she would take whatever help she could get.

oOo

Daphne's side ached from running so far so fast. She was on the far side of the island now; but even that distance couldn't feel far enough. The waves crashing against the rocks below her reminded her of every death over the past weekend.

_Crash!_ Freddy.

_Crash!_ Mrs. Pickett.

_Crash!_ Scooby.

_Crash!_ Pickett.

_Crash!_ Rogers.

_Crash!_ Sylvester.

_Crash!_ Marianne.

_Crash!_ Jennifer.

Every person invited to Manse Island had come of their own free will. Every person who came to Manse Island was or would end up dead. She lowered herself to the ground, hugging her knees and staring out at the sunset. "Two little Indians, sitting in the sun. One got frizzled up and then there was one," she chanted softly. "One got frizzled up and then there was one. One got frizzled up. Daphne got frizzled up." It didn't sound very pleasant to be frizzled up, she decided. She wondered if the ferry master would see the pattern of the deaths and connect it to the rhyme. Maybe he would try saying the rhyme with the appropriate names in the place of 'one'. How would that sound? "Ten little Indians, going out to dine. Fred choked his little self and then there were nine," she tested. Somehow that made the death even more morbid. No, she hoped he wouldn't use their names in the rhyme.

Marianne's dead eyes stared at her from the water. She cringed at the dull glint of sun on waves and turned away. Since the deaths had sped up so rapidly this afternoon, she had her suspicions that there wouldn't be anyone left alive to tell the ferry master the story of ten little Indians who were snuffed out on Manse Island.

She made herself stand again. The short sitting session had done almost nothing for her aching feet and sides, but she needed to find a good hiding place to sleep for the night. She was not going back to the house no matter what. Her stomach rumbled and she glowered down at it. "I'm _not_ going to go back just so I can eat. I won't starve in one night." While the light lasts, Daphne told herself, I'll try to find a shack or something. If it comes down to it I can hole up in one of the houses in the old fishing village. I'm sure the past won't mind some company.

oOo

Daphne's room hadn't had a hook on the ceiling. This was frustrating. None of the rooms did. Shaggy's had been the hardest for her to search, but she pretended he was just asleep and avoided looking at the sheet-covered body. As a result the search of his room was probably the quietest search of a ceiling ever accomplished.

Velma waited until the sun had disappeared behind the trees – but not the water; she knew the sun couldn't be completely gone yet due to the brilliant pink and salmon in the sky – before she crawled into bed with the book she'd settled on earlier. As long as Owen really wasn't her, the locked door to her room was comforting even though she'd methodically gone through the entire house and locked all doors to the outside. The quiet 'weeeek' of the book's binding as she opened it reassured her that this, at least, held some semblance of normality. She glanced over at the clock. Eight thirty-four pm. She'd turn out the light at ten if she hadn't finished it yet.

It was the middle of chapter five when her vision blurred the words on the page and her eyelids closed. If she had checked the clock again she would have seen it was only nine.

oOo

Daphne snuggled down as best she could in the hay she'd swept together. A hayloft wasn't her first choice for a makeshift bedroom, and it certainly wasn't a five-star hotel, but it would do. Her eyes were closed almost before she had finished finding a comfortable position.

The sun had gone down. The island was dark. And it was nine ten.

oOo

She jolted awake, knocking the book to the floor. What was wrong with her? Velma never fell asleep reading. She stretched and looked at the clock. Nine fifty-seven? Jinkies, she'd dozed awhile. She supposed she could allow herself a little longer than usual since she seemed to have already gotten some sleep. "Eleven tonight," she promised as she leaned down from the bed to pick up the book. "Let's see, I was on page eighty-six…just about to get into the good stuff." Flipping to her place, she settled back against the pillow to continue.

_There are some fundamental plasma parameters that must be established before we continue. Here ion mass is expressed in the proton mass units_ μ = _m__i_ / _m__p_. _Temperature is expressed in eV. _K_ is the wavelength; _Z_ represents the charge state; _k_ represents Boltzmann's constant; _y_ represents adiabatic index (see chapter six for more on this subject). Quantities used but not listed here are in Gaussian cgs units._

Absent-mindedly she turned to chapter six and dog-eared that page for reference. This was going to be a good read.

The clock read 10:12.

oOo

Daphne woke up just as something creaked closed. Something else went click-click-click just before the searing pain in her left hand registered. Her fingers were trapped above her head. Twisting her neck to see, she found herself somewhere she never would have thought she'd end up.

Inside an oven.

There weren't any lights on outside, but she knew it would be useless anyway. By now her murderer would already be gone. The clicking she'd heard had to have been the oven turning on. She shifted, trying to stay above the swiftly heating coils below her. Staying completely away from all the heat would be impossible though, as she soon found out.

Her legs gave way and she hit the burning coils. Her mouth opened in a silent scream of pain and terror. Then she realized. She was feeling again. This was first-person Daphne, she could feel, she wasn't depersonalized anymore.

She was burning. She was alive – no, she was more than alive she thought with a queer sense of giddiness. She was burning and she was more than alive. Funny that it took dying to feel this way. She couldn't feel her physical body now, but she could see. She was dying. She was burning.

She was more than alive.

It was 9:31.

oOo

In the morning Velma awoke to a few rays of light trying to claw their way across her face. She rolled over to the other side and held the pillow over her head to shield her eyes. After a few minutes of contemplating whether staying in bed to sleep in a little longer or getting up to continue investigating would be more beneficial, she finally gave up and climbed out of bed to get her glasses. "It's only seven thirty?" she whispered incredulously, then felt silly. Why was she whispering? She was the only one in the house.

_Unless Daphne came back to kill you and is waiting outside._

_She wouldn't do that. Why would she do that?_

_Why not?_

_Because I don't have a motive for her._

_Just because you aren't smart enough to come up with a motive for her doesn't mean she doesn't have one._

She flinched at the insult her mother's voice delivered. She knew she was smart. But the truth in the thought still stung. Daphne had no motive…that she could think of. That had always been the disclaimer she'd had to add. She sat down at the desk and drew out her notebook. She'd forgotten to cross off Jennifer's motive yesterday. Flipping it open, she reached for her pencil. When she touched nothing but the surface of the desk, she started and looked. Oh. She'd bumped it and made it roll a little ways away. No harm done.

Scratch-scratchity-scratch. Jennifer Morley now had no part in her notebook. Velma smiled. No part in her notebook and no part in her life, what little she had left of it, that was.

All of a sudden she jumped up, eyes wide. Today was the day the ferry master would come back. She'd made it! She could get off Manse Island alive; she wouldn't have to be frizzled up or hung or however her death was supposed to be. She could have danced. "Except that I'm a terrible dancer," she mumbled, grinning uncontrollably. What the heck? Nobody could see her.

She ended up tripping over the chair behind her and falling onto the ground with a heavy thud. The seat of the chair jabbed painfully into her right hip. Carefully untangling herself from the chair, she stood and surveyed the damage done.

"See, that's why when people do happy dances, you don't have one." She was still grinning. She righted the chair and moved it under the desk. Nothing could spoil the relief she was experiencing right now. She could go home. It would be a little bit difficult to explain the story of Manse Island to Gram and Gramps, but she would manage. What could they do, kill her? She laughed out loud at the thought. She'd survived. That was all that mattered. They'd learn to understand, and if they didn't?

Her grin widened. There was still the possibility she was Owen for them to contend with.


	11. One Little Indian Left All Alone

"_**When you find me in the morning, hanging on the warning, oh-oh-oh – the joke is on you."**_** Pleasant. We all love jokes, don't we?**

**Chapter Ten: One Little Indian, Left All Alone**

Velma caught her breath and organized her thoughts. Now that she had stopped grinning and gotten herself under control again, she acknowledged the twinge of hunger clamoring for attention in her stomach. Daphne wouldn't be in the house. She'd locked all the doors last night. That fact set in her mind, she unlocked her bedroom door and slipped out. She smiled as she opened first Jennifer's door, then Marianne's, and worked her way down the hallway. Her hand hesitated on Shaggy's door, but she forced herself to open it and hurried past. Reaching the end of the hall, she turned and walked back to the staircase. "I made it," she sang out, "I made it through alive."

She was just excited enough to slide down the banister. Hopping off the end, she did a little dance on the way through the games room. The front hall made her pause. That curious painting looked a little bit different now. She couldn't quite put her finger on just how, but something was off. She cocked her head and stared at it.

If anyone had seen her there, head tilted and standing completely still in the middle of the front hall, they would have thought her mad. Of course, it didn't hurt that she was.

Snapping out of her stillness, she strode over to the painting. The motion looked funny on her small frame, but she didn't notice. The painting was different. "What happened to you there?" she asked the man with the tortured expression. "Don't you look nice with the pretty new necktie." She laughed. The noose around his neck didn't scare her – she'd made it out alive. She was fine.

The brunette gave the painting an indifferent flick on the trunk of the tree to show what she thought of its scare tactics now and opened the door to the dining room. The smile froze on her face. One little Indian boy stood alone in the centerpiece, facing her. She swallowed.

"So it is me…" Then where was Daphne's body? Probably out somewhere on the island, she decided, because I locked the doors. She can't be inside. "But it's me," she countered, "so I could have unlocked the door and brought her inside. Not that she would have followed me." She looked down at her bare arms and adjusted the sleeves of her t-shirt. She was strong enough to have dragged a dead body inside, she concluded, but she would go looking for the corpse after breakfast. "I'm a serial killer." The smile returned to her face. "I'm a serial killer." It wasn't such a bad thing to be.

After all, she could be dead.

She made her way around the table, swiping a finger across the face of the Indian as she passed him. The kitchen door swung open when she pushed against it. Now the only problem was: what to have for breakfast?

"What would the other personality like?" She pretended to curtsy when something else odd caught her eye. Four long pale fingers poked out of the oven door.

That's when the fear caught up with her.

She let herself drop to her knees, sat back on her heels, and tugged the oven open. A charred, glistening object tumbled forward, a tiny lock of red hair unharmed on a somewhat spherical part of the object. She observed this as calmly as if it were a normal occurrence to have a burnt body fall out of one's oven. The glistening, she recognized, was where the blood vessels had split open under the pressure of the heat. Since the skin was missing in most places, the blood could be seen, along with other parts of internal organs she remembered from anatomy class. "Hello, Daphne." Her voice held a tremor that gave away her fear. She had done this. This was her work. "You must be feeling a bit like the witch from Hansel and Gretel. That's quite understandable, don't worry." She slowly rose to her feet again. The only other part of the body not burnt or destroyed were the four fingers on the left hand, presumably because they had not been exposed to the extreme amounts of heat generated by the oven. The abrupt change between natural skin and burnt skin made the fingers look heavy in comparison with the rest of the corpse.

Lovely. She backed away one step at a time, slowly, then faster until she rammed into the doorframe of the pantry. Velma whirled, eyes flickering down to the bottom shelf. Breakfast, yes, right. She still needed to eat. She stepped in and picked out a slice of bread and a banana. The toaster still worked, she would have to assume.

It did. She wasn't sure how to move Daphne up to the redhead's room without destroying the body, save those four haunting fingers. As she sparingly buttered the toast, she thought about it. She couldn't carry it, that much was for sure. Maybe she could gently transfer it to a sheet and then drag that up the stairs and at least get it into the room, possibly onto the bed if she was careful enough. It would be difficult, but it was doable. If she'd knocked her out and put her in the oven she could drag her up the stairs. She sat down in the same seat Dorothy Pickett had occupied just a few days ago and set the toast beside the banana.

She looked at it for a moment. _They're crooked._

_So are you._

_Am I? Or is it the rest of the world that's crooked, and I'm the only one going along my way evenly?_

_You're the one that's crooked._

_You sound so sure._

_Because I am. Don't you know by now that Mother always knows best?_

She laughed out loud. _I think _you_ should know by now that I never listened to you._

_And look where you are now thanks to that life choice. On an island, all alone, with nine dead bodies. You've killed nine strangers. Why?_

_Don't ask me. Ask the other personality._

_I would if I knew how, but because I don't I'm asking you._

She opened her eyes to find herself standing in front of the kitchen door, facing into the kitchen as if she'd just come into it from the dining room. The banana peel was in her hand and the toast was missing. "I hope it tasted good," she mumbled, addressing no one in particular but herself. Velma tossed the peel into the trash and made her way through the still-messy kitchen to the servants' quarters. The Picketts wouldn't be needing their spare sheets, just lying there. Then again, she thought, neither would Daphne, really. She avoided looking at Pickett's two halves that the sheet pulled over him couldn't disguise.

The closet held stacks and stacks of extra linen sheets on its shelves. She blinked. She only needed one sheet for this job, and it didn't seem right to use a good linen sheet for shuttling a charred corpse up to its room. There, on the top shelf. She stood on her toes, somehow managing to pull down a regular cotton sheet, accidentally unfolding it in the process. Well, that saves some time, she nodded. Not much, but it does. Velma went back into the kitchen and spread the sheet onto the ground. Then she awkwardly hauled Daphne's body onto it and bent over double, holding the edges of the sheet, to drag it through the house and up the stairs.

_This might take a little while._

_Might? Little?_

_Will! Will, okay? Will. It will take a long while._

_That's what I thought._

_Are you sure you aren't the other personality?_

_Of course I'm not. You wouldn't be talking to me in your head if I was. You shouldn't have an awareness of the other one for all practical purposes. It's not right._

_So what?_

_So plenty! Stop talking to me now and get back to reality. You always end up zoning out when we have these conversations, don't you?_

"Blah blah blah," she said under her breath, but saw she was halfway up the stairs. At least the other personality seemed to be cooperating. Daphne's room was only three doors down the hall. After pulling the sheet with the body up onto the hallway floor she let go to stretch out her back. Walking backwards while bent over tends to cramp one up dreadfully, reflected Velma as she stooped to resume her task.

Once in Daphne's room the last obstacle proved to be the hardest. She struggled to lift the corpse's sheet without knocking a limb off. She had to think awhile before actually trying anything. Wouldn't want to ruin evidence for the police and all, she told herself dryly. In the end she accomplished the undertaking by wrapping the sheet around Daphne's scorched carcass and then lifting the whole thing onto the bed, leaving it wrapped for the sake of not having to see it again.

She exhaled. Now that that was done with, she reasoned she had better get prepared for the ferry master's arrival and pack up what she'd brought. She certainly didn't have as much as some people. She raised an eyebrow at the purple suitcases that still looked in need of unpacking stacked high. And she'd thought _Gram_ liked clothes. Leaving Daphne's room, she returned to her room and swung the door open.

There she stopped. A fishing net, knotted with painstaking care into a noose, was hanging from her ceiling and swinging gently in the breeze from the open window. Her eyes followed the makeshift rope up to the top, where it was tied onto a hook in the bottom of the centerpiece. The last little Indian boy, broken cleanly off the base of the centerpiece, stood on her desk, staring hopelessly at her as if saying she should have known she'd had it coming all along. "So that's why I couldn't find a hook," she whispered. "It was on the bottom of the centerpiece the whole time. Now, why didn't I check that for any clues?" She wondered how it had gotten up onto the ceiling like that, and how it was staying in place. Perhaps there was some sort of sticky substance on the ceiling to keep it firmly attached?

The net serving as the rope swayed, as though it was beckoning to her. She could hear her mother's voice coaxing in her head. _It's your turn, my dear. The rhyme still needs to be finished, after all, and there's only you left to complete it. It's your turn now._

It barely registered that she was moving the chair from the desk to the spot underneath the noose. "One little Indian left all alone…" She climbed onto the chair and slipped the necklace into place. "She went and hanged herself, and then there were none." Laughter surged up in her throat. "I'm the last one." The laughter was coming harder now, verging on hysterical. "I'm the last one! I'm the last one – and it isn't me!" The other personality could take over, could take the blame, could take it all. She didn't care anymore.

Down on the jetty a flock of white and grey seagulls, startled by the sudden sound of wild laughter reaching them on the wind, flew off squawking to each other about the disturbance. Then the laughter was cut off abruptly, and in the house the only sound was that of a chair creaking as it fell onto its side.

Ten little Indians all summoned to stay on Manse Island. It was only for one weekend. But not one of them lived to tell the story. It was probably for the best. The ferry master had been told not to come back for a week and a half anyway.

"_**What a nice long leash, what a nice tight noose – never worked for me but it sure does look good on you. You've waited all your life; your wish is coming true. Bless your heart for beating me right out of you!" **_**And the last little Indian finished the rhyme…right?**


	12. Epilogue

"_**I'm not sorry at all, no, no, oh I'm not sorry at all, no, no. I'd do it over again."**_** Well, you won't be able to if you're dead now, will you?**

**Epilogue: Keep You in the Dark…So Who Are You?**

Detective Kearney tapped his foot impatiently. "This doesn't make any sense. What happened here, Kate, and why?"

His partner, Detective Kerrington, scowled at him. "We aren't on first name terms, Kearney. If I knew what happened do you think I'd be waiting on the crime scene investigators to get done with the prelim search?"

"Rhetorical question," he muttered, trying to ignore the barbed comment she'd made. So he wasn't the best at keeping relationships formal. She didn't have to kick him around just because he'd asked if she had a boyfriend.

The thirty-year-old woman crossed her arms as the crew of preliminary examiners exited. "You can go in now," nodded the photographer. "We've got good photos and a couple of fingerprints. It's pretty gory in there though."

"We'll manage," Detective Kerrington said stiffly. Kearney knew she hated having to be second to the prelim examiners. She swept in ahead of him, taking care to snap on her latex gloves and pointedly asking if he'd remembered his.

"Yes," he said with a vain effort at hiding his indignation. He pulled his own gloves on and let her lead the search of the house.

When the police left that night they had found each of the ten bodies lying on their individual beds, sheets neatly pulled over them. It was going to be difficult to judge the order of death since that blasted ferryman hadn't returned to the island in time. The house was locked and there was sufficient temperature management to preserve the corpses as best as possible under the circumstances, and the tight screening meant no insects could get in to infest them. Nice for the autopsy and PM people to determine the cause of death, but for when they needed to manage the timeline? Not so much. At least they had identified all ten from belongings found in the rooms.

The whole situation was queer. As far as they could tell there was no murderer. From first impressions they thought that Miss Dinkley had been the killer from the noose around her neck and evidence that she had probably hung herself, but the ferry master swore he'd never touched anything in the house and would never take a body down from the ceiling and put it on a bed "all respectful-like like that, cos I ain't the kind o' man to touch a dead body and get infected wi' all its cursedness." So that was a dead end.

Even after the investigation closed three months later they never found the letter taped to the door in the library passageway. If they had, they would have read the confession of a serial killer by the name of U. N. Owen.

oOo

_To whom it may concern,_

_I've always wanted to use that phrase to start a letter. There are several things I've always wanted to do which I have accomplished this past weekend._

Owen paused and chewed on the eraser of the pencil, thinking. Where to start? So many things done, so many things to choose from. With a nod it was decided – at the beginning, where so many good stories begin.

_First, I have always wanted to sneak poison into someone's drink. That first death I really didn't care who died, and poor Frederick Jones was just unlucky enough to get the glass with the cyanide in it. In retrospect that could be a good thing. He seemed like a very annoying sort of fellow. I never got along with self-centered types._

Another pause. Owen didn't have to describe every death over the weekend. Just the ones that counted as things accomplished.

_I have always wanted to kill someone. Strange, do you think? I don't think so. It's fun now that I know what it feels like. I grew up with a police officer for a dad, however, and he worked in the homicide department. Because of this I understand capital punishment, killing the guilty but not the innocent. I understand that. So when I decided it was time to fulfill that irrepressible need I found I couldn't kill just any random stranger – I needed to find someone who was guilty and had escaped the law. So began my quest._

_There's another thing I've always wanted to say._

Owen grinned. This really was very enjoyable.

_To spare you the details – and another! I'm talking so prettily – I'll skip ahead to having actually found my…not victims, that's a terribly ugly word. Let's say targets. Once I had found my targets, I watched them for five months. They never knew I was there. Then again, no one ever does, but that's beside the point. I learned their habits and the way they worked. Then I played to their interests in a letter signed either Ulysses N. Owen or Mrs. U. N. Owen. They all fell for it._

_They came to the island and I began to tick them off the list. They figured out the 'unknown' allusion in my pseudonym fairly quickly. I probably should have made it harder, but all the same. They made it so easy! Not one of them even tried to stop me once they'd discovered I was one of them until I was ready to kill Sylvester. Then Velma at least got some sense and started taking notes on my little lessons._

_Oh, yes. I'm assuming whoever finds this doesn't know. I won over her trust so easily I almost couldn't believe it._

The pen stilled over the paper. Owen stretched and rubbed his stomach thoughtfully. He stood and went to get a snack.

_There. Now where was I again? Right. I thought she caught me once, when she came to tell me dinner was ready. I had to hurry to shut off my music. My heart was thudding so loudly. Thankfully she didn't recognize it – or, I assume, heard the lyrics. After she was gone I kicked myself so many times for being so obvious about it. I mean, how much more obvious could I be, listening to a song titled "D.O.A."? I was even singing the part about "You know I did it, it's over and I feel fine" out loud! After she left I had the sense to only sing the part that qualified as innocent aloud and hum the rest to myself._

_For Jennifer's sake, I will say: Thank the Lord for the phrase 'love is blind'. I suppose technically it would apply as puppy love apparently is deaf._

_The police will want to know how I did it. How, they'll ask, did he manage to kill nine people and convince them he was dead at the same time? The trick is…paying attention in science class._

_Most people wouldn't think I did pay attention. But I listened, ohh yes I listened, when we went over tetrodotoxin. Puffer fish poison if you're a little less science-inclined. I didn't take very much; after all I still needed to be capable of movement in time to pull off the next death and really didn't think a week of paralysis would be too beneficial. _

_Allow me to explain. Tetrodotoxin causes paralysis of the muscles but leaves the consumer conscious during an artificial 'coma' if you will. It lowers the body temperature and slows the heart rate enough to be unnoticeable during a doctor's – or nurse's – pulse-taking test. I'm assuming it's what Juliet took to fake her death. African voodoo shamans use it sometimes. Of course, they end up buried alive…_

_Just a little swallow of tetrodotoxin, inject some allergens into a few key places and sprawl out on the ground. Once it wore off I was free to resume my duty and free of suspicion. I followed Velma back out to the apiary and read her little notes. Funny, I thought to myself, but if she's including herself as a suspect, why not let her be one, and plausibly so?_

_I had to hurry with Sylvester's death. He was reading an old war tactics book when I strangled him. Old man never saw it coming. Then I swiped Jennifer's precious Bible, tore out a few pages, and stuffed them into his mouth to line up with Velma's little theory. I got some good ideas from her notebook. She might have been a good helper if I'd let her in on it. Unfortunately I was afraid she'd do something stupid, like tell the others._

_If they had checked the pages I tore out, I practically gave myself away. Genesis 2 and 4, and I even crinkled the pages around the passages reading "And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground." And "And now thou art cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand; When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth." Did none of them think to read it?_

_Apparently not._

_Marianne was fun to kill. She was just standing there, waiting to die, and I remembered she'd pushed her boyfriend off a cliff. The rest was just common sense. After I tossed her out as far as I could, I remembered a thing from history that seemed fitting, so I said it over her, like a little prayer or something. I'm not very poetic, but I can try. "Cum fossa et furca," I said solemnly, "with drowning-pit or gallows."_

_Before I continue, I need to back up a little bit. There was a handwriting analysis that the others did shortly after figuring out that I was one of them. They all thought my handwriting, as Owen, was Velma's. Lucky for me. The reason I passed without suspicion is that I'm one of the true ambidextrous people in the world, and each of my hands have different writing styles. My right hand is the one I used for Owen's writing. My left is the one I used for giving a sample._

_There. Now I can continue. I'm not very organized with my letter-writing; I never once made even a B in English class on it. Oh well. Not as though I need to be organized._

Owen stopped and furrowed his brow. "What else do I need to say?" he asked himself. "What else is there to say, even?" He popped his neck a couple times. "Like, maybe I should…okay."

_Pickett's death was easy. I crept out and took the axe before he reached the woodshed. When he got there he looked around in surprise. I almost laughed at the old man. He bent over to look behind the woodpile and I gave him my Little Lizzie Borden impersonation. With his wife I just slipped her a little extra medicine. It was early enough on that nobody thought to check who was where in the night._

_Who else was important? …of course! Jennifer. How could I forget. I knew she might be a little more resistant to the killing, so as I was waiting for her to pass out I consoled her that she could look at it as a mercy killing and that she'd see God soon enough if she really did believe. She made a funny gurgling noise and slumped over. I don't know if she was admitting she didn't really believe it and just needed an excuse to dole out punishment or if she was agreeing with me, but she died in any case and I tied her up very nicely. I think having her hug herself was a good touch, if I do say so myself._

_Daphne next. I had to force some sedative into her mouth while she was asleep in the hayloft – what a stupid place to hide; that's the first place any decent hide-and-seeker would look – but then she slept like a baby all the way into the house. I think I may have accidentally woken her up once I put her in the oven, but no matter. She's dead too. I had the sense to leave her fingers poking out so they can identify her using DNA or fingerprints, whichever. I have a feeling that when they turn up criminal records for Daphne Blake they'll also see the name she uses when designing for that fancy clothing place. I'm impressed with Marianne's acting if she recognized her. If not, she must have made herself forget what Julia Harper looked like._

_I keep forgetting. Whoever finds this letter isn't going to know a thing about these murderers, and definitely not as much as I, having studied them for such a long time. Marianne's boyfriend broke up with her because he was in love with Julia Harper, whom you now know was an alias of Daphne Blake's. He then was shoved off a cliff to his death._

_See, this is why I've never had a girlfriend._

_Lastly, Velma. Now, she was an interesting one. If you've never met someone who's just a little whacked out, then you've never met anyone interesting. She had problems, I tell you. Killing her own parents with a poisonous gas that could permanently damage the atmosphere around the house? Ohh, as soon as I heard that she used carbon monoxide I added her to my list. Nobody gets away with hurting the environment when I'm around, and that includes Velma Dinkley. I'm pretty sure I had even her convinced she was Owen up until just before she died. I'm sorry I did so, but I just had to ask. She was laughing so hysterically._

Owen stopped, closing his eyes to picture the scene still fresh in his mind. _"You didn't take your medicine, did you?" he asked quietly._

_Her laughter stopped suddenly, as if it had been cut off. "No." The smile in her voice was so evident it made him smile. Then she kicked the chair over._

_It fell with a satisfying thud._

He realized he was still smiling. That moment, when she had finally accepted that she was in fact on his side, was so perfect. He continued with his letter.

_I won't write down what it was, but it was my favorite moment of the weekend, which is saying something since I got to kill so many people. All in all, yes, I had fun. After I finish this letter, I'm going to put it in the secret passageway in the library, along with Daphne's ID card stating that she's Julia Harper. Then I'll go finish off that cyanide. We'll just see how well the police figure it out, along with their crime scene investigation crew._

_Funny that Velma never figured that one out. Curly Sewing Iron crew? C.S.I. crew? Hmph. I thought it was fairly obvious. Maybe it was just me._

_Sincerely signed,_

_The one who got away with it all_

_Norville C. Rogers, son of Officer Owen Rogers in the homicide department_


	13. Did You Notice?

"**Did You Notice?" and Other Little Tidbits and Disclaimers**

Prologue song quote: The Pretender by the Foo Fighters

Chapter One song quote: Forgotten Past by Death (I have never heard this one; I was running short on lyrics because I had almost every other chapter's quotes picked out so I just ran a search on findbylyrics dot com)

Chapter Two song quote: Arise by Flyleaf

Chapter Three song quote: Heaven on a Sunday by Paul McCartney

Chapter Four song quote: Isis by Bob Dylan

Chapter Five song quote: One Big Mob by Red Hot Chili Peppers

Chapter Six song quote: Ignorance by Paramore

Chapter Seven song quote (beginning): Work by Jars of Clay

Chapter Seven song quote (end): Heavy in Your Arms by Florence + the Machine

Chapter Eight song quote: Teddy Bear by Elvis Presley

Chapter Nine song quote: Watch It Burn by Disciple

Chapter Ten song quote (beginning): The Joke by Lifehouse

Epilogue song quote: Decoy (Live) by Paramore

oOo

_Did you notice…_

-Rogers specifically quotes the Foo Fighters' song D.O.A. when he says "Nothing like the taste of sweet decline."

-There are some cameos of titles of Agatha Christie's other works, including "While the Light Lasts and Other Stories," "Crooked House," "Murder is Easy," "The Body in the Library," "By the Pricking of My Thumbs," and "N or M?"

-In the confession letter Rogers never says what the business card Velma finds outside the cellar means.

oOo

Thanks:

Special thanks to Agatha Christie, Queen of Crime and Duchess of Death, for the original And Then There Were None. Thanks to all the reviewers - sreejn, KI (I keep calling you potassium iodide), RussM, Kasey Rose, Devil'sxAdvocate, Velms, Kelly of the midnight dawn, Romanian Princess, and anyone else I may have forgotten. Thank you.


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